The Turkish Regulatory Body finally approved the Turkish Telecom tariff changes, which were being discussed in the sector for the past 2 weeks.
According to the new tariff the fixed fees paid by the subscribers will be marked up by 25%, and the long distance call fees will decrease between 4,5 and 55%. The interoperability fees made with Turkish Telecom by the private companies which have been continuing with their protests in this matter are dropped by 0,007YTL (7 New kuruş).
Turkish Telecom had last made tariff changes on 7 July 2004 with the headline of “discounts up to 80%”. Since then it was not making changes in the tariffs. Thus, inflation is expressed to be the reason for the mark up of fixed fees.
On the other hand, the rivals of Turkish telecom (must say the private ones) are making discounts in intercity telephone services which is the area long distance telephone services (LDTS) firms operate in. For 2 weeks this has caused for objections by these firms in lines of “competition”.
With the start of deregularization in the beginning of 2004 and the private telecom firms that have got their licences starting from 17 May 2004 are complaining about this tariff change of Turkish Telecom.
The firms were criticizing the mark up of the “fixed fee” which is the non competition part of the tariffs, and the discount in “long distance fee” which is the area of competition; whereas no fee changes were made in the “interoperability fees” they pay. Another objection of the private firms is not approaching the tariff changes on a cost basis.
The LDTS firms state that the price changes must be made on a cost basis starting 31 December 2006. However Dr. Paul Doany said that the last change is cost based and that Turkish Telecom has given its costs to the Turkish Regulatory Body.
On the other hand of the Turkish Telecom tariff changes lay the allegations that inflation will be instigated. When Durmus Yılmaz, the Chairman of Central Bank, stated that the mark up of telephone along with the mark up of electricity will affect the inflation in the speech he made right at the beginning of the year; the telecom tariff change caused for disputes in this matter as well. In the back stages of the sector it is discussed that the Turkish Telecom tariff changes were for this reason deferred till March, and that if it is applied right in January, the inflation targets will deviate at a great rate.
The Turkish Regulatory Body was not approving the tariff changes for a long time. It was known that work was being carried through on tariff changes since November. However it came to the agenda with the statements made by Turkish Telecom in the last week of December.
Along with the tariffs approved by the Turkish Regulatory Body it is seen that changes are made to the interoperability* fees. It is noted that wit the discount of 0,007YTL the 1 Euro cent level is achieved. The interoperability fees were 0,02YTL within the region and 0,037 YTL outside the region.
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