We remember that PTCL offered its Free Unlimited Internet almost a month and half ago. The move by PTCL disfigured dial-up ISP businesses in the country, and they had no other option but to seek PTA for any solution.
It is told that there went plenty of hearings and discussions over the issue. After detailed discussions and deliberations, a new model for dialup ISPs is being emerged wherein all ISPs will provide free dialup access to the customers. ISPs would advertise/market their service on service quality, customer support, etc., and access would be open for all PTCL phone users to connect to Internet using any ISP’s username and password.
PTCL would charge one local call for every 20 minutes for Internet users and this revenue would be shared between PTCL (30%) and ISPs (70%).
In case of calls originating from outside area codes, this revenue share would be reversed, PTCL 70% and ISPs 30%. Long distance Internet calls (from area codes where ISPs are not located) would still be charged at the cost of local call/20 minute.
There would be no scratch cards for the ISPs and customers would be billed in their PTCL’s monthly bill for a local call of 20 minutes duration.
This would mean Rs. 6/hour of dialup Internet for the users. Currently, the Internet scratch cards are being sold at Rs. 2 to 4/hr. With one local call per hour, the expense of users was around Rs. 5-6/hr. Industry standard (in Pakistan) duration of Internet calls is 20 to 30 minutes. So for the users, there would be hardly any change in the charges. Users would also have more choices to use any ISP they like and would be billed in PTCL’s bill at the end of every month.
This new regime is expected to be announced within next few days.
Complete Story Via: PAkGrid
Sounds very anti-competitive. They’ve managed to form a cartel and completely eliminate price competition.
shit man
they just want to eliminate the lower class’ internet usage
It is a bit expensive than previous Rs. 10 per four hours. It would be now Rs. 24 per hour i.e., More than Double.
@omerfarooq,
Ooops I meant Rs. 24 per four hours.
this is just decieving people
What a bad decision taken under the umbrella of PTA!
I’m a poor student and cannot afford broadband internet. Due to my course requirement, I am a regular Dial-Up Internet User and have been using LinkDotNet’s Rs.50 Card offering 25 hours; i.e. Rs.2/hour. My daily average internet usage is 4 hours that was just Rs. 10.43 = (2 * 4) + (2.01 + 0.42 GST) before but now it costs Rs. 29.19 = 4 * ((2.01 + 0.42) * 3).
(2.01 + 0.42) is charges for a local.
0.42 is the 21% GST on 2.01.
Let’s assume that during the usage of 4 hours, I encounter 3 disconnections. Even then it did cost 17.29 = (2 * 4) + {(2.01 + 0.42 GST) * 3}, much less than 29.19.
What is this government doing with poor! I’ve heard that the former chairman of the PTA, Shehzada Alam had rejected this proposal once.
On the one side, ISPs claiming falsely the internet is free but on the other side, poor public is still buying internet scratch cards unknowingly, benefiting the ISPs two folds. I myself have scratch cards of around Rs.350 and they are now just waste.