Hello! Thereâ€™s good news for phone users

NEW DELHI, OCT 18: Communications Minister Ram Vilas Paswan today announced some good news for telephone subscribers. For one, registratio...

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NEW DELHI, OCT 18: Communications Minister Ram Vilas Paswan today announced some good news for telephone subscribers. For one, registration forms for new telephones, which were sold at Rs 10 per form, will now be available free-of-cost.

Thanks to the impending competition from private operators, the Minister also announced a reduction in registration amounts for new phone connections from the present Rs 3,000 per line to Rs 2,000 for urban centres and Rs 500 in rural areas from the earlier Rs 1,000 per phone line connections. The new rates are expected to be implemented by November one.

Not only this, if the subscriber chooses to install his own instrument, he would get a discount on the amount charged for registration. In urban centres, this would be around Rs 500 per line if an individual uses his own telephone instrument in his premises rather than opting for a MTNL or BSNL (Bharat Sanchar Nigam) connection.

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Speaking at the Economic Editors’ Conference here today, Paswan said that the attempt, through these measures, was to bring in more flexibility and better customer relations. “We have even simplified the application forms to accommodate the bare minimum information and cut out on cumbersome forms,” Paswan said.

Announcing some more steps to make it more convenient for subscribers to use telephones, bills can now be paid by cheque even over the weekend to Central Telegraph Offices (CTOs) and District Telegraph Offices (DTOs). So far, telephone bills could be paid only on the five working days.

Paswan has even directed faster and simpler shifting norms for telephones — within a week for shifting phones within the same exchanges and within two weeks for inter-city shifting of phones. However, this announcement has to be taken with a pinch of salt as several of his predecessors had tried to do this but the government-run departments have often failed to keep up with such promises.

Paswan also announced that unpaid phones in police stations and hospitals, which were hitherto disconnected completely, would now have outgoing calls cancelled, while incoming calls will be allowed so that callers to these numbers are not inconvenienced.

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On the macro-policy level, Paswan said that by next month detailed guidelines would be finalised for introducing new basic service operators, and cellphone operators. While unrestricted entry will be allowed into basic services, for cellphone operators, the bidding in the next round will decide for the fourth operator in each state.

Paswan also said that MTNL would finally be out with its new cellphone service by January – a final deadline after the company has shifted its launch date announcement several times already.

– Application forms to be available free-of-cost (earlier Rs 10).

– Registration charges slashed to Rs 2,000 for urban phones and rural phones to Rs 500.

– Application forms simplified.

– Subscribers to be able to pay telephone bills on weeends by cheque at CTO/DTO.

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– Subscriber to have option to use his own instrument and get discounts on registration fee.

– Licences for fourth cellphone operators in most states by next month.

– Guidelines for new basic service operators by next month.