Business stung with local call charges

Ruapehu Bulletin, Volume 8, Issue 372, 5 February 1991, Page 16

Business stung with local call charges

Businesses in this area will be charged for' the local calls they make from midnight on Sunday 31 March. At this time telephone line rentals for these businesses will reduce. Telecom Central's Saies and Marketing Director, John Moriarty said the announcement of the exact date of the introduction of Local Call Charging fulfils a commitment Telecom made late last year to give customers plenty of notice before introducing Local Call Charging. Mr Moriarty said the proposed February introduction had been deferred to allow a smooth transition to local call charging throughout the region. "We have identified that some business customers cannot be

charged for local calls until the telephone exchange to which their business is connected is capable of processing per minute local call charges". Those customers affected will be advised by Telecom Central. In this area they include National Park customers. Businesses in Wellington have been paying for local calls since February 1990 and the new charging system is being introduced to other parts of the ' country progressively as part of Telecom's policy of aligning charges more closely to actual usage of its services. Under the new system businesses will be charged four cents per minute (GST incl) between the hours of 7am to 10pm each day, with a discounted rate of 0.5 (half) cents per minute (GST incl) at other times. Mr Moriarty said business line rentals will be reduced to offset the charge for local calls. Telecom's standard B1 monthly rental for large businesses will reduce from $102.72 to $67.98 (GST Incl), while the monthly rental for smaller businesses will drop from $75.92 to $67.98(GST Incl). Residential customers will not be affected by the 31 March change, said Mr Moriarty. He said however, that work is progressing on offering residential customers 60 years of age and over a payment option of a lower rental plus a per minute local call charge. This system is presently being trialled in Wellington. He said this could be an attractive option for those who make few outgoing calls but rely on their phone as a necessity.