ICT Minister Chamisa orders Tel One to cut tariffs

Despite many workers, especially civil servants, earning just US$100 a month the companys landline customers have been receiving bills as high as US$1000 per month. On Thursday Chamisa issued a ministerial order barring Tel One from terminating services for any defaulting clients until the matter is resolved by cabinet. He told a media briefing that his ministry was trying to investigate the billing system being used, because they had detected very disturbing trends. He said Cabinet is due to meet in June to decide on a new tariff regime and this should be in place before the next billing cycle in July.

Complicating matters is that there are two issues at stake – high tariff charges and a distorted billing system. Although the tariffs are due to be reviewed customers will be worried by the Ministers statement that this would not be done in retrospect, meaning that customers might still be stuck with the previous high bills. Chamisa sought to re-assure them by saying outstanding bills will be rationalized to respect the problems that people have been going through.

Commenting on the billing system he said there were other artificial elements brought in by the changes in currency and this led to a mischievous conversion from the Zimbabwe dollar to the US dollar. Chamisa said the operators were also using old mechanical billing systems instead of the more modern digital platforms than can measure call charges per second. This he said contributed to some of the high bills customers were receiving.

Chamisa also said the government was worried about the high call charges being a catalyst to inflationary pressures and this is why they had moved swiftly to intervene. He said the government would also consider new players in the market in order to enhance quality of service through competition. We will be careful not to undermine the rehabilitating capacity of the existing players who have really been with us for a long time, he added.
SWRadio Africa