BT cuts cost of calling mobiles

Ta very much

By Tim Richardson • Get more from this author

Posted in Telecoms, 12th August 2004 14:16 GMT

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BT is to cut the cost of calling mobiles from its landlines by up to 36 per cent from 1 September following an earlier ruling by regulator Ofcom.

Residential punters could see the cost of calling mobiles from land lines fall by up to 36 per cent, while businesses could see some calls to mobiles capped at 30p per hour.

Today's announcement follows an earlier ruling by Ofcom in which it ordered the UK's four major operators to cut termination charges. The ruling - which applies to mobile network operators' wholesale charges for connecting incoming calls to their networks - ends a regulatory saga that dragged on for six years.

Following a series of investigations Ofcom concluded that direct controls should be imposed on the charges to operators for terminating calls on the 2G mobile networks of Vodafone, O2, Orange and T-Mobile.

Now, BT has signalled its intention to pass on those savings to consumers.

Said BT exec, Gavin Patterson: "This is great news for our customers. We said we would pass on all these savings to residential and business customers and we are doing so. Ofcom has decided that calling mobiles from landlines was too expensive because of the high charges imposed by mobile operators." ®