NTC: Refund order shouldn't affect 'unli' services

MANILA, Philippines - The National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) on Wednesday said that "unlimited" services of telecommunications companies should not be affected by its refund order.

"Unlimited [call and text] services should not be affected," NTC Director for Common Carriers Authorization Department Edgardo Cabarrios said in an interview over radio dzMM.

Cabarrios also said that the NTC is certain that the telcos -- Globe Telecom, Smart Communications Inc. and Digitel Mobile Philippines Inc. -- has enough financial resources to refund their subscribers.

The NTC ordered the thred telcos to shell out at least P1.42 billion in refund to subscribers for failing to slash their P1 text fees by 20 centavos despite an existing order from the commission.

Cabarrios announced on Tuesday that telco providers are being penalized for non-compliance with NTC Memorandum Circular 02-10-2011, which reduced text interconnection charge to P0.15 from P0.35. The reduction was meant to make text messaging more affordable to the public. The order supposedly should have lowered the rate per text to P0.80 from P1 as early as December 1 last year.

The memorandum circular was issued on October 10 last year but it took effect in December.

The refund covers excess charge of P0.20 per off-net SMS or text messages – estimated at 20 million – sent from one network to another. The amount is estimated at P4 a day since December last year.

Cabarrios explained that the refund for prepaid users should be credited to the numbers while the refund for postpaid subscribers should be credited to their accounts.

Latest data showed that the PLDT Group’s cellular subscriber base reached 68.6 million as of end-September. Subscribers of wireless arm Smart Communications Inc. stood at 25.6 million, followed by Talk ‘N Text with 26.5 million, and Digitel’s Sun Cellular with 16 million.

On the other hand, Globe’s mobile subscribers stood at 32.1 million as of end-September.