News

Tariff Consultancy Ltd launches first edition of the Asia-Pacific Mobile Benchmarking Pricing Service

Published: Fri 19 December 2014

Tariff Consultancy Ltd (TCL) releases the First edition of the Asia Pacific Mobile Benchmark Pricing Service which provides a review of prices levied for mobile services both voice and data by operators in the Asia-Pacific Region.

The Asia Pacific Mobile Benchmark Pricing Service offers an insight into pricing for post- and prepaid services. It comprises of a database providing detailed pricing information of services namely mobile voice, mobile broadband and international usage including roaming. Additionally, the report provides a comparison of the various services in an easy-to-use format.

Some of the highlights from the findings are:

The Benchmark has found that some Asian operators offer a significantly greater number of tariffs than others i.e. SingTel for example offers 20 postpaid plans with one product allowing the user to ‘tweak’ the plan and 6 prepaid SIMs.. In total 247 postpaid and 93 prepaid plans are offered by the 28 operators surveyed in the Asia region.

The Benchmark compares three postpaid plans for each operator, namely lowest priced, medium and highest priced in terms of rental charged per month. Rental charges vary from as little as USD 0.34 (Sri Lanka) to as high as USD 200 (Philippines). The average rental per month of all postpaid plans is USD 28.49 per month.

The Benchmark finds that out of the 73 postpaid plans covered a total of 14 do not include any minutes, 17 of them do not include any SMS and 31 do not include any data.
i) The lowest inclusive allowance for minutes is 5, for SMS 50 & for data 10 MB
ii) Only 6 plans from 4 operators offer unlimited voice to all networks, 4 plans from 4 operators offer unlimited on-net minutes, 4 plans from 4 operators offer unlimited SMS and 7 plans from 5 operators offer unlimited on-net SMS and for data 3 operators all their highest priced plans offer unlimited data.

Out of all the plans selected in the 14 countries both post and prepaid:
i)        The per minute charge for a voice call is no more than USD 0.15 except inJapan, where the charge varies from USD 0.20 to USD 0.36 per minute.
ii)       The average cost of a 1 minute domestic on-net voice call is USD 0.07, USD 0.07 to landlines and other mobile networks.
iii)     Domestic SMS prices vary from USD 0.01 to USD 0.099 and MMS from
USD 0.02 to USD 0.85, with the average at USD 0.02 for an SMS.

The survey found that some operators levy lower international call charges to theUSAthan to a neighbouring country. However, the average call rate to theUSAis USD 0.21 compared toSingaporeat USD 0.29 per minute. IDD bundles are on the increase reveals the survey and can offer discounts of well above 50 per cent on the per minute rate.

Roaming charges attract an average of USD 3.13 per minute when calling back home from the roaming destinationUSAand USD 2.03 when inSingapore. Also for other services as the summary shows below, roaming in a neighbouring country like Singaporeis far cheaper.

Roaming destination	USA	Singapore
Calling back home per 1 minute	3.13	2.03
Calling within the country per 1 minute	1.60	1.12
Receiving a call per 1 minute	1.44	0.99
Sending an SMS	0.49	0.44
Data Roaming per 1 MB	13.71	11.08

The survey reveals that operators offer plenty of roaming voice and data bundles
bringing the per unit rate well below the default roaming rate.

Mobile Broadband offerings are offered on a post and prepaid basis. The survey reveals that offerings vary from as little as USD 0.04 for 4 Mbit/s of data up to up to a plan that costs USD 70 including 32 GB. Inside the bundle pricing varies from USD 0.45 per 1 GB to just USD 130.

Note to editors:

About the Asia Pacific Mobile Benchmark Pricing Service – The service comprising of a database and a report which provides analysis of voice and data for both Pre Pay and Post Pay services across 28 MNOs in 14 Asian countries (including Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Laos, Malaysia, Maldives, Pakistan, Philippines, Singapore, and Sri Lanka).

The service compares pricing for postpaid voice and data services (connection, rental, usage (domestic, international and roaming), included usage, inside and outside the bundle pricing. The information is provided in tabular format allowing easily to see which operator offers what as part of a package and at what price as well as how it compares with other operators in the region.

The report on its own is available for GBP 1,295.00 and GBP 1,595.00 if the subscriber opts for both the report and the Database.

About TCL (Tariff Consultancy Ltd) – TCL is aLondon based international research consultancy which specialises in the analysis and tracking of pricing for fixed line, mobile and Data Centre operators on a worldwide basis. TCL provides services for regulators, enterprises and MNOs including Price Tracker services, bespoke consultancy and reports.