Thread: Airtel Mobile Plans

New Airtel Mobile Plans

Airtel too has joined the tariff war and being India’s largest mobile operator how can it lag behind when the rest of the cellular services are offering breathtaking tariff plans. Airtel too has announced the latest one paisa per second plan for all local and STD calls. But Airtel as always maintains a different standard and keeps its rates higher than others. There one paisa per second plan too has exceptions and conditions.

Bharti Airtel is no doubt one of the finest service providers in the country, but one cannot deny that they sometimes try to charge little more than other cellular services. On one hand when giants like Reliance Mobile, Tata Indicom, BSNL, and Idea are offering similar services throughout India at rates one paisa per second to all networks, Airtel maintains a standard where one is charged extra 0.02 paisa per second to other networks. That means you only get the one paisa call per second if you call to the same network.

If you calculate the difference for other networks, it is found that the rest are offering 60 paisa per minute calls whereas in Airtel the same call will cost your 72 paisa per minute. And that sounds really ridiculous. For what reason Airtel has kept its charge more .12 paisa per call to other networks is only known by them and if it goes like this soon, it has to loss its peak position of having the largest number of subscribers. The flow has started because people find other networks cheaper than Airtel and they are none the less than Airtel in network coverage.

And more than that Airtel Mobile has kept the pay per second plan only for prepaid customers. The post paid customers won’t be able to enjoy any such plan for now. That is another carelessness that can be seen in such a large and repute service provider. Unlike other service providers Airtel offers no roaming tariff of 1 paisa per second.

While announcing the plan Mr. Atul Bindal said, "As the undisputed leader in the Indian telecom industry, we are committed to delighting our customers through superior network, great customer service and best value for money. Today, our network covers 110 million customers, has 100,000 sites and is available across 4.25 lakh towns and villages in 1.5 million outlets."

The number of customers and coverage of cities have nothing to do with the cost of calls. Pride hath its fall! It is baseless to have additional 0.02 paisa per second for a call to other networks. Anyways besides the pay per second plan let us have a look at the other existing plans of Airtel in Delhi and NCR.

Airtel Regular Prepaid (Airtel/DL/GSM/11) – Pack Price 49/- with 0 rupees talk value

* Local call rate – 1

* STD Call rate – 1.5

* SMS Local – 1

* National – 1.5

* International – 5

Airtel campus 150 (Airtel/DL/GSM/14) Student tariff plan Lifetime validity – Pack Price – 149/-

* Local Call Rate – 50p on Airtel, 1 on CDMA and landline, Other GSM mobiles – 50p on weekend and night 11pm to 6am otherwise 1 rupees in Day time

* STD Call Rate – 1

* SMS Local – 20 paise

* National – 1

* International – 5

Airtel SUK 149 – Lifetime Validity (Airtel/DL/GSM/12) – Pack Price – 149/- (5 ruppes free airtime)

* Local call rate – 1

* STD Call rate – 1.5

* SMS Local – 1

* National – 1.5

* International – 5

Airtel Twin Pack 149 (Airtel/DL/GSM/13) – Pack Price – 149/- (for 2 SIM cards and 10 Rupees talk time)

* Local call rate – 1

* STD Call rate – 1.5

* SMS Local – 1

* National – 1.5

* International – 5

Airtel Freedom 249

Call Charges – Local

A2A – 1p/sec

A2M – 1.2p/sec

A2L – 1.2p/sec

Call Charges – STD

A2A – 1p/sec

A2M – 1.2p/sec

A2L – 1.2p/sec

SMS Charges (Per SMS)

Local SMS – 50 paise

National SMS – 60 Paise

International SMS – Rs. 5

Other call charges such as ILD/Roaming will continue at current tariff and per minute pulse.

I use postpaid and airtel has one of the highly charged tariffs in postpaid .. am shifting to prepaid and might even shift operator once number portability comes in