Telecoms

NTC mulls lowering inter-connection charges

Abe Olandres Editor-in-chief July 4, 2011 · 1 min read

Listen to article

Instagram now lets users reorder their posts on their profile iOS 27 Adds Native Baybayin Keyboard to iPhone: Here is How to Enable It AMD Radeon RX 9070 GRE announced GPD MicroPC 2 with Intel Core 3 N350 announced Nintendo Direct to unveil Switch 2 games for second half of 2026

This should be good news to everyone — the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) is considering the idea of lowering the inter-connection charges between telcos in the next 3 years.

The current inter-connection charge for calls is Php4 and Php0.35 for SMS. NTC wants it to go down to Php1 for call and Php0.15 for SMS. When that happens, regular charges to consumers will also go down.

If the regular fees to consumers is Php6.50 and Php1, for calls and SMS respectively, NTC’s move could theoretically low calls to just Php3.50 and SMS to Php0.80.

However, this could also heavily affect the bottom-line of all telcos concerned.

Telcos send out over 2 billion text messages per day. If the reduced charges take into effect, that could shave off at least 20% of their revenue. Now that’s a huge chunk of their bottom-line already and we’re not counting call charges yet.

Of course, we all want lower connection fees but the question is “can the NTC make it happen?”. Or maybe this is NTC’s response to Rep. CasiÃ±o’s payola allegations.

React to this article:

ntc ruling sms and voice calls

Abe Olandres

Editor-in-chief

Abe is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of YugaTech with over 20 years of experience in the technology industry. He is one of the pioneers of blogging in the country and is considered by many as the Father of Tech Blogging in the Philippines.

8,007 Articles

View all posts by Abe Olandres →

48 Comments

deer hunter 2014 · 12 years ago

Have you ever considered about adding a litgtle bit more than just your
articles? I mean, what you say is important and all.
But think about if you added some great photos or videos to give your posts more, “pop”!
Your content is excellent but with pics and video clips, this website
could certainly be one of the best in its field.

Superb blog!

clash of clans · 12 years ago

It’s a shame you don’t have a donate button! I’d most certainly donate to this excellent blog!
I suppose for now i’ll settle for book-marking and adding your RSS feed to my Google account.
I look forward to fresh updates and will share this blog with my Facebook group.

Talk soon!

www.prnewswire.com · 12 years ago

Many thanks for this superb write-ups. Keep sharing fantastic articles!

get youtube · 12 years ago

As the admin of this web page is working, no uncertainty very shortly it
will be famous, due to its feature contents.

jp · 15 years ago

Dapat siguro yang pag-improve ng network services at infrastracture nila ang pagtugunan ng NTC instead na yung rate dahil huli na rin.

torque15 · 15 years ago

i saw this featured on TV and i was ready to go ballistic when i found out!

with digitel, i get it, because they offer same network sms for 0.50. but with the other 2 telcos pegged still at 1peso/sms, does that mean they charge us the inter-connection fee as well? EVEN when texting the SAME network? ouch!!!

strawhatjp · 15 years ago

Wow. Then, this something na dapat nating ika-excite.

creativeyou · 15 years ago

telcos should study the proposal of NTC, telcos wil benefit also. if u have low service charge = more text/call = more subscriber = more revenue = everyones happy its that easy!

Cherry · 15 years ago

^ The thing is though, lowering the prices will not necessarily increase the subscriber by a substantial amount to recuperate the loss because every who needs and wants a mobile phone already has one.

Personally I think it’s too much, too late.

dano · 15 years ago

tama! para sa mga tulad kong tamad mag-unli at mahilig sa regular load haha. Wala na akong problema sa signal at services eh… ung price nlng. haha. kuntentong kuntento ako sa smart. not unlike sa globe at sun na walang signal.

nameless · 15 years ago

Who cares? we have Unlimited services nowadays. Telcos should focus more on giving more affordable but better internet services.

Robert Tan · 15 years ago

This would be great news. The telcos are making lots of money anyway and by sheer volume of users i think they could take the cut. Hope NTC passes this.

Robert Tan
rainingpesos.com.ph

Jonaflormicfren · 15 years ago

It could be better if in the soonest time. They should act faster.

NTC SUCKS · 15 years ago

NTC SUCKS AND ONLY MOVES WHEN ALIGATIONS ARE ARROUND!!!!

telcos_suck · 15 years ago

ang laki laki na ng kita ng mga TELCOS na yan, dapat lang babaan. yung owner ng SMART ang dami ng nabiling properties / assets dahil lang sa kita nya sa SMART.

i’m sure ganun din sa ibang TELCO’s if kayang i lower ng SUN ang prices nila vs Prices ng Globe at Smart ibig sabhin sinasakim lang ng dalawang telcos ang mga kita mula sa consumer.

iAGReee · 15 years ago

TAMA!

boggart · 15 years ago

public interest. and who may i ask is the public they are interested in? the paying public, those who will pay anything to get better service out of these utility companies, or the mooching public, them who want more for less? ntc and casino are playing a political russian roulette where none of the perceived beneficiaries win, only their own inflated egos.

of course the utility companies are worried. are they? most of them are converting their revenues to more than 25% income. great for stockholders, bad for consumers. my opinion is that instead of lowering these interconnection rates and thereby affect the revenues, why not just mandate the telecoms to utilize part of revenues, say 30%, for capital expenditure specifically to upgrade and update their facilities.

and again, quoting from the cdrking thread, you get what you pay for.

PaulC · 15 years ago

of course a study had been made to this proposal. this is timely to divert the issue between PLDT and Digitel and also the payola allegation. NTC seem to forgot what consumers needs.. RELIABLE SERVICE. you pay 1 month of internet fee and then disconnected for days/weeks and file for rebate and tell you that sorry sir the finance dept doesnâ€™t honor your report. stupid customer care isnâ€™t it?

Kenth · 15 years ago

Agree. Ang usual palusot ng telco we will evaluate your complaint sir/ma’am. Then when you call back or they call you to update, “Our finance department asys it is a valid transaction. Sorry we cannot credit you back”.

Buset. So I asked them explain to me then who in his right mind registers for unli surf 50 1day unlimited internet (which allows you to browse all sites), then then will register unli facebook on top of this. I’m pretty sure I did not register for it. So they say sige sir I’ll just make a special request to credit you back.
After 24 hours they automatically charge another 20bucks for unlifacebook, like how they automatically activated unlifacebook the other day. Smart is really smart in milking subscribers/customers of their hard earned money.

Let’s see what NTC can do, kung may magawa man sila, hopefully not to the advantage of the Telcos na naman. >:(

PaulC · 15 years ago

of course a study had been made to this proposal. this is timely to divert the issue between PLDT and Digitel and also the payola allegation. NTC seem to forgot what consumers needs.. RELIABLE SERVICE. you pay 1 month of internet fee and then disconnected for days/weeks and file for rebate and tell you that sorry sir the finance dept doesn’t honor your report. @#^%&%* customer care isn’t it?

Dennis · 15 years ago

the NTC’s mandate is to seek a balance between the interests of the telco companies and the public interest (with the public’s interest on the upside). they’re just doing their job to see if telco’s can provide quality services without the hefty price tag.

it seems like good news, but i guess there’ll be some compromises made on this proposal. i doubt the telco’s will remain quiet on the matter.

konqueror7 · 15 years ago

we already have unli-services which are more than adequate.

the lessening does not only affects the telcos, but also the load retailers.

konqueror7 · 15 years ago

i don’t like it at all. more useless and spam messages will be sent. i miss the day when one would think first before sending a message.

Benchmark · 15 years ago

base sa news…sabi bababa daw kita ng mga telcos….by golly…ang laki na nga ng kinikita nila, that excludes yung mga nawawala na load…plus mga kalokohan na promo kuno yet uubusin lang load mo.

Probably telcos should be ready for the heavy traffic of SMS and calls if that happen…back to the days you will see “MESSAGE SENDING FAILED” while sending SMS hehehehe