The Nigeria Communication Commission (NCC) has announced the review of the International Termination Rate (ITR); interconnection charges set by mobile traffic carriers. This review was made public through a brief notice released earlier this week by the NCC.
Following a public announcement on the NCC website, the brief notice released by the NCC and dated 5th October states that:
"The Nigerian Communications Commission, on September 16, 2016 reviewed the termination rate for international inbound traffic from ₦3.90/min to ₦24.40/min. The interim rate will subsist pending the conclusion of the study of the Determination of Cost Based Pricing for Mobile Voice Termination Rates."
The increase in the ITR can be traced to a recommendation in a publication prepared by NCC's Policy, Competition & Economic Analysis Department in 2015. The recommendation was based on the premise that telecommunications service providers and Government may prefer higher rates that brings in hard currency and can fund investment, expand domestic network, fund innovation and improve quality of service.
"Since international termination rate have no impact on the domestic subscribers, it would be in the interest of the economy to allow international traffic termination rate to be settled through negotiation and commercial agreement between the domestic service providers and international traffic carriers." - NCC's Policy, Competition & Economic Analysis Department
This move by the NCC heavily affects inbound international calls which have no impact on the domestic subscribers. The reviewed ITR increase seems to be NCC's response to help domestic service providers increase their revenue.
