Telcos asked to cut service fees

 Staff Reporter (haseeb@khaleejtimes.com)

 / 18 June 2013

The Central Bank of the UAE has urged the country’s telecommunications operators etisalat and du to reduce their service charges, to aid the government’s plans to make its services available and affordable through smartphones. The banking regulator asked the telecoms to reduce the cost of core systems and telecommunications services, such as data transmission and SMS messages, and enable payment transactions in order to encourage customers to carry out transactions on mobile devices. It was stated by the governor of the Central Bank of the UAE who chaired a meeting with the telecommunication companies in support of the m-Government initiative launched. The meeting, attended by etisalat group chief executive officer Ahmed Abdul Karim Julfar, du chief executive officer Osman Sultan, and Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank chief executive officer Tirad Mahmoud, who was representing the UAE Banks Federation. The meeting explored how best to remove any obstacles to m-Government initiative from both the banking sector and the telecommunications sector. The officials agreed that etisalat and du would implement a more user-friendly, high capacity e-mail system to facilitate fast and efficient transmission of bills. The Central Bank said it would develop a common payment system to link in to the faster systems. The Central Bank urged the banks to use an SMS to confirm transactions on credit cards and bank accounts as a means of reducing fraud. During the meeting, the parties decided to form a technical working group representing the three institutions to ensure rapid and effective implementation of suggestions, with the need for close collaboration between the banking and telecommunications sectors being recognised in order to put into place effective regulations. Meanwhile, both telecommunications providers on Monday announced new offers to lure customers to their services. Etisalat has introduced new weekly and monthly roaming packages for voice and data usage for all customers in the UAE to meet the increasing requirements of subscribers travelling abroad. Subscribers will have the option of choosing roaming packages valid for one day, week or month, to match their duration of stay and travel profile, starting at Dh25 a day. The new packages will charge calls received starting from 50 fils per minute, while a Traveller Pack offers a combination of 1GB of data and 1,000 incoming voice minutes valid for a month for Dh500. Subscribers can use their voice allowance in all roaming destinations, while data allowance can be used across 143 networks in 70 countries covering major travelling destinations. Meanwhile, du has announced welcome offer to those customers starting up prepaid cellphone accounts with the company. The offer incudes 100 megabytes of free data usage to be used within 30 days, as well as Dh10 credit. “Data is increasingly important to our customers, which is why we have revamped our prepaid line to include 100MB of data usage. This is ideal for customers who are new to data usage and want to try it for the first time; it’s the perfect introductory package with no additional costs,” said du chief commercial officer Fahad Al Hassawi. The amount of data would allow 200 minutes of streaming music, 20 minutes of streamed video, or visits to more than 60 websites, the company said. Etisalat New ‘Traveller Packs’ by Etisalat offer a range of options for overseas usage, with daily, weekly and monthly offers. Prices start at Dh25 a day, while one month with 1 gigabyte of data and 1,000 incoming call minutes will cost Dh500. du Du has launched a bid to tempt people over to their prepaid mobile service, with a welcome offer of Dh10 credit to use on any service and 100 megabytes of data usage. The company said it was ideal for customers who had not tried data usage before