Incoming calls to Pakistan to cost less

[Proudpakistaniguy]

ISLAMABAD: In the wake of rampant increase in grey trafficking, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has approved abolition of the International Clearing House (ICH) mechanism, which will reduce the rate of incoming calls to Pakistan from abroad.



“After the approval of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, the Ministry of Information Technology, on the recommendation of PTA, has withdrawn its directive on the ICH issued in 2012 and making the APC (Access Promotion Contribution) rate to be zero,” a statement issued by the PTA stated on Tuesday night.



The Ministry of IT issued its directives after consulting all the stakeholders, including the regulator Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA). The PTA, in recent days, wrote two letters to the MoIT for giving its input and recommended to the government to deregulate the market as the monitoring mechanism required regular updates on all its equipment and even in that scenario, grey trafficking could not be controlled.



“The market dynamics have changed altogether and it was a dire need to change the ICH policy. The PM took this decision after consulting all the stakeholders,” said the sources.After the withdrawal of the ICH, there will be now 15 LDIs fighting for their share to terminate the international incoming calls into Pakistan with flooring of the Access Settlement Rate (ASR) at around 5 cents per minute, which stood at 8.8 cents per minute level under the ICH mechanism.



The LDI operators – through agreements with foreign operators – terminate the international incoming calls on local networks and charge a fee on per minute basis.



Through the ICH all the international traffic is being handled by the PTCL, while other operators had withdrawn their commercial agreements with foreign operators and closed their circuits for termination of international traffic.

After the ICH within a few months the international incoming traffic from legitimate channels dropped from 2 billion minutes per month to below 500 million minutes per month. The rest of traffic is now coming through illegal channels labelled as grey traffic.



After witnessing this steep decline, the government was left with no other option but to withdraw the ICH policy in order to curb the grey trafficking and making the expatriate Pakistanis happy over the reduced rate of incoming calls from abroad.



After the ICH policy, the use of Skype and Viber had increased manifold which had started giving a negative impact to those cellular companies that had invested billions of dollars for winning the 3G and 4G licences in Pakistan.



Incoming calls to Pakistan to cost less - thenews.com.pk

 

[EagleEyes]

Now they are reducing the cost after Zardari had increased it to earn extra pocket money. Overseas Pakistanis are smart, they have sent iPhones to their relatives and hooked them up with Skype and Viber. And voila.. you dented your telecommunication market dear chutiya Ministry of Information Technology,

 

[Proudpakistaniguy]

Now they are reducing the cost after Zardari had increased it to earn extra pocket money. Overseas Pakistanis are smart, they have sent iPhones to their relatives and hooked them up with Skype and Viber. And voila.. you dented your telecommunication market dear chutiya Ministry of Information Technology,

Dair ahey darust ahey..call charges to Pakistan from overseas are double/triple compare to rate of neighbour countries bangladesh/India..sykpe and internet calling via apps viber/line was not possible/common on mobiles before because of slow GPRS connection but now it will be used more because 3g has been introduced in Pakistan

 

[EagleEyes]

Dair ahey darust ahey..call charges to Pakistan from overseas are double/triple compare to rate of neighbour countries bangladesh/India..sykpe and internet calling via apps viber/line was not possible/common on mobiles before because of slow GPRS connection but now it will be used more because 3g has been introduced in Pakistan

With 3G enabled, this was to come. Most people were just hooking up Wifi prior to that.

I think it is safe to assume, 3G was being delayed for one of these reasons may be!

 

[Proudpakistaniguy]

With 3G enabled, this was to come. Most people were just hooking up Wifi prior to that.

I think it is safe to assume, 3G was being delayed for one of these reasons may be!

To be honest apps like line give more clear and loud voice than international calling cards if connection is stable on boht sides and plus free HQ video calling..nowdays android phones are also very cheap and everyone can afford it so this 3g news were more welcome by overseas Pakistani and i agree they have delayed 3g purposely to earn money from otherside but people always find better and cheap alternate ..akir ko wo b pakistani he hein

 

[EagleEyes]

To be honest apps like line give more clear and loud voice than international calling cards if connection is stable on boht sides and plus free HQ video calling..nowdays android phones are also very cheap and everyone can afford it so this 3g news were more welcome by overseas Pakistani and i agree they have delayed 3g purposely to earn money from otherside but people always find better and cheap alternate ..akir ko wo b pakistani he hein

It will take sometime for the Pakistanis locally to adopt 3G to the fullest, but surely the future is bright in terms of communication... and communication will bring business aka rising economy.

 

[My-Analogous]

Now they are reducing the cost after Zardari had increased it to earn extra pocket money. Overseas Pakistanis are smart, they have sent iPhones to their relatives and hooked them up with Skype and Viber. And voila.. you dented your telecommunication market dear chutiya Ministry of Information Technology,

After failing to robe Overseas Pakistani, now they put tax on overseas flights and remove peanuts from International call

 

[Fracker]

Now they are reducing the cost after Zardari had increased it to earn extra pocket money. Overseas Pakistanis are smart, they have sent iPhones to their relatives and hooked them up with Skype and Viber. And voila.. you dented your telecommunication market dear chutiya Ministry of Information Technology,

There are still many countries like. Middle east, where these luxuries (Skype & Viber lol) are blocked, so we are always searching a way out of this mess. May be this help us to use GSM to call our relatives. Normally we (tech cheater) are fine with what ever blockage comes, but problem is when poor class can't call their relative for weeks just because worried about the cost.

 

[Darth Vader]

Dair ahey darust ahey..call charges to Pakistan from overseas are double/triple compare to rate of neighbour countries bangladesh/India..sykpe and internet calling via apps viber/line was not possible/common on mobiles before because of slow GPRS connection but now it will be used more because 3g has been introduced in Pakistan

few months back when I was in Pak I had wingle With a battery it was little so i had it with me everywhere So Moving Wifi with me for cell phone

There are still many countries like. Middle east, where these luxuries (Skype & Viber lol) are blocked, so we are always searching a way out of this mess. May be this help us to use GSM to call our relatives. Normally we (tech cheater) are fine with what ever blockage comes, but problem is when poor class can't call their relative for weeks just because worried about the cost.

fring , Line , List goes on and on if their is a will their is a way

 

[Kompromat]

Effective since?

 

[Shabaz Sharif]

Skype is taking over

 

[Fracker]

fring , Line , List goes on and on if their is a will their is a way

Fring Blocked
Line Blocked

I introduced "mypeople" a korean, that also got blocked, then I introduce "talkray" for Pakistanis/other expat where we can't call anymore but recieve still works. So now I use "Google Hangout" & my wife on VPN got USA number so her family who don't use internet at all can call directly to USA number. But my point was there is no problem for me, but for those who are not techno, also most of the worker's families are not literate enough to search. Sometimes people don't have time to search for new "Leak". GSM calls are relatively easy

Effective since?

August.

 

[Proudpakistaniguy]

There are still many countries like. Middle east, where these luxuries (Skype & Viber lol) are blocked, so we are always searching a way out of this mess. May be this help us to use GSM to call our relatives. Normally we (tech cheater) are fine with what ever blockage comes, but problem is when poor class can't call their relative for weeks just because worried about the cost.

Why calls to middle east are more expensive? Its even more expensive than calling to pakistan

 

[Fracker]

Why calls to middle east are more expensive? Its even more expensive than calling to pakistan

Actually I don't know, the only thing which I realize is, there is monopoly of the services providers, like in oman only two, Omantel & Nawras, Not much competition, on the top, I heard some taxes on Arab switch which cost internal calls even more expensive.

 

[Proudpakistaniguy]

Actually I don't know, the only thing which I realize is, there is monopoly of the services providers, like in oman only two, Omantel & Nawras, Not much competition, on the top, I heard some taxes on Arab switch which cost internal calls even more expensive.

May be because of this kafeel system as they probably have strict regulations on foreign workers and business man