Reduced international call rates

When the telecom industry was being deregulated, i kept hearing stories of how it benefited other countries which had deregulated their telecom sectors. One such story which clung to my mind was that of Germany where international call rates became cheaper than local call rates. Ofcourse, that was for landline based operators and does not really tie in here.

VOIP has been slowly making its way into the cellular sector, marking a drastic reduction of call costs for the consumer. The first to enter this market was, ofcourse, Paktel (now that i write these things here, Paktel does seem to be the first mover in a lot of things). International dialing rates were slashed down dramatically w.r.t other providers who were still using the traditional systems.

Recently, Mobilink launched lower-rate internatioanl dialling for its postpaid (Indigo) customers and later, rolled out the same service for Prepaid (Jazz) customers. Dividing the world into five zones, they've structured the call rates from Rs. 2.35 to Rs. 20. I've yet to see what connectivity they're offering but it promises to be good.

Warid telecom (ofcourse, i just HAD to put something about them here too) also offered up a similar service by the name of Warid 111, though as yet, its only offered on Prepaid packages. International dialing on postpaid still goes through the old system. Warid's 111 rates are even lower than Jazz still starting from Rs. 0.99 (for Zem 60) for zone 1 countries to Rs. 15.99 for zone 4.