Regulator says PLDT’s ‘unlimited’ landline offer breaks rules

The Philippines’ dominant telecoms company Philippine Long Distance Telephone (PLDT) yesterday launched a nationwide service offering unlimited calls to all areas, but the move was greeted coolly by the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) which said such promotions break local telecoms rules and as such, must be stopped. According to a report from online journal Business World, the telco’s ‘Call All’ offer promises unlimited calls all over the Philippines for an additional PHP250 (USD5.27) on the user’s landline phone bill. Anyone taking the add-on will be given a PLDT ‘Landline Plus’ subscriber identification module (SIM) for a fixed-wireless connection. ‘We are targeting over 1.3 million PLDT retail landline subscribers and we are also aiming to capture at least 200,000 additional applications each month,’ PLDT retail voice acquisition head Patrick S Tang told reporters. However, rival operator Digital Telecommunications Philippines (Digitel) challenged the legality of the service arguing that stating that fixed-wireless subscribers registered within a local calling area should not be allowed to make calls outside that area. The NTC concurred noting that wireless local loop (WiLL) calls made outside the local calling area should be considered national long-distance calls and should come with interconnection charges.