Communications tariffs will be reduced in spring 2010 following the coming decline in interconnection tariffs in late March, says the Georgian National Communicators Commission (GNCC).
The current tariffs were introduced in May 2008, Gela Butbaia, the head of the GNCC Department of Strategic Development and Competition, told the February 18 news conference.
On May 5, 2008 top consumer tariffs for landline calls shrank to 0.04 GEL from 0.06 GEL, while the cell-landline interconnection tariff were cut to 0.148 GEL from 0.188 GEL. The figure equaled 0.248 GEL before 2005.
Landline operators had set discriminative tariffs before 2007. Namely, landline operators charged 0.08 GEL on cell operators in interconnection tariff and 0.04 GEL - on other landline operators, Butbaia noted.
The coming decline in the interconnection tariff will slide the payment costs, which are charged for switching other operators into the network. Consequently, the tariff lowering will shrink not the inner call tariffs, but the tariff for connection into the network of other operators.