After Airtel, Idea to charge all prepaid customers on per second basis

Idea Cellular, India's third largest telecom operator by subscribers, today said it would move its 1.5 million prepaid customers who are on a per-minute plan to a per-second billing plan over the next 30 days.

“We will now be offering PSB (per second billing) plan, by default, to our entire base of nearly 157 million existing and new prepaid users,” said Sashi Shankar, chief marketing officer of Idea Cellular.

Out of its total prepaid customer base, most are currently under per-second plan and only 1.5 million customers are using per-minute plan. They will now be charged on a per-second basis in a phased manner in different circles. However, they will have the option to choose per-minute plan by purchasing minute-based special tariff packs.

The announcement by Idea is similar to Airtel, India's leading telecom operator, as telecom firms are concerned about call drop charges and the government’s intention to investigate whether they are improperly using it to raise revenues.

Other telecom operators such as Telenor have started offering compensation to their customers for call drops.

IDEA Cellular Limited