Tariffs of the fixed line telephone in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) are likely to be lowered in 2009 due to an initiative to introduce Carrier Pre-selection Service (CPS) by the country's telecom regulator, local newspaper Gulf News reported on Sunday.
The UAE Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) has directed Etisalat and Du, the only two telecom operators in the country, to make network adaptations in order to provide CPS in the fixed line telephone, according to the report.
CPS allows telephone users to have their calls automatically routed through a network offering lower call cost, without the need to dial a prefix or use special equipment.
The introduction of CPS will increase competition in the UAE telecom sector, reduce prices, and enable consumers to freely choose their provider of national and international fixed line call services, TRA said in a statement.
Consumers in the UAE were able to choose their provider of national and international fixed line calls via Carrier Selection Service (CS) since 2007.
After the introduction of CS, retail prices for fixed network international calls have decreased between 35 percent and 80 percent for those customers who took advantage of the service, according to TRA's Director-General Mohammad Nasser Al Ganim.
But the technical limitations of CS prevented competition from reaching 100 percent of the population of the UAE, Al Ganim said.
TRA's decision to introduce CPS aims to give consumers freedom of choice and increase competition in order to cause price reductions.
"We expect to see further price decreases when competition is available via CPS throughout the UAE," Al Ganim said.
"TRA aims to accomplish and achieve this goal in the beginning of 2009. We are confident to say that the service providers will work diligently to put into place the necessary measures and implement the TRA directives," he added.
Source: Xinhua
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