Last updated on January 16th, 2023 at 06:12 am
Just after announcing unlimited free night calling facility by BSNL for its landline and Broadband combo plan subscribers, Airtel has ignited the fight and launched two packs priced at Rs 49 and Rs 99 for making unlimited voice calling for their Broadband customers.
The Rs 49 pack allows the fixed as well as mobile broadband customers to make unlimited local calls to any network. The mobile customer can activate this pack by sending SMS in the format UNL49 to 53636.
The Rs 99 pack allows the fixed as well as mobile broadband customers to make unlimited local and STD calls to any network anywhere in the country. The mobile customer can activate this pack by sending SMS in the format UNL99 to 53636.
The difference between two operators is that BSNL will offer unlimited free night calling from 9PM to 7AM starting 1 May 2015 while Airtel is allowing making unlimited calls anytime.
But the Airtel is invoking Fair Usage Policy (FUP) and restricing the “Unlimited calls” to 5000 minutes per month only. Another catch is that Airtel has also restricted the number of landline or mobile number to 150 on which their broadband customers can make unlimited calls. The terms and condition also says that Airtel can cancel this plan at any time automatically.
This is just an eyewash for the consumers. Unlimited voice calls is going to be delivered the same way unlimited Broadband services are being promoted by Airtel.
There is a FUP ( Fair Usage Policy ) linked to every broand user for which Airtel offers a promised speed for a certain megabytes of download after which the broadband speed is downgraded. For example if you have a 2 MBPS unlimited broadband plan, it will have a FUP of 10 to 12 GB of data download post which the speed will be reduced to 512 kbps.
Similarly what customers are not aware of is that A fair usage policy (FUP) is applicable on the unlimited free calling schemes, with the company specifying a limit of 5,000 minutes of free calls. Airtel also adds consumers availing of the schemes will require active broadband plans, and that the schemes aren’t available for commercial use.
The biggest question now is that who and how will now keep a track on the amount of minutes used and what is the applicable charge after the FUP 5000 minutes get exhausted or declared exhausted by Airtel. How can a user track how much voice data has been used on a day to day basis. Very nice trick by Airtel to try to make some money when various smartphone application like whatsapp are offering free voice calls that can be made using Airtel WiFi Broadband service.