The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday lowered interconnection fees from mobile phone networks to fixed communication networks, with the connection charge dropping by 15 percent per minute.
The policy is expected to cause Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信), which has a monopoly on the fixed communication market, to lose about NT$30 million (US$930,000) in revenue.
Meanwhile, the commission raised the interconnection fees from fixed communication networks to mobile phone networks by about 8 percent per minute.
NCC spokesperson Chen Jeng-chang (陳正倉) said that the new policy would not directly affect the retail price and is simply a recalculation of costs among telecom service providers.
“The commission is about to set a new price cap for retail voice communication charges by the end of this year, and the recalculation of costs may help lower the retail price,” he said.
The NCC said calls made from non-Chunghwa mobile phone networks to fixed communication networks topped 2 billion minutes per year, and fixed to mobile calls reached 1.5 billion minutes.
When a call is made from a fixed communication network to a mobile phone network, the mobile phone service providers have the right to determine the communication charge. While it costs NT$6 per minute to call from a mobile phone to a regular phone, the fixed communication service provider only receives NT$1 of the interconnection fee.
By 2011, however, the right to determine the communication charge will be turned over to the fixed network service provider.
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