Govt may raise direct international call rates

Govt may raise direct international call rates

JAKARTA (JP): The government is considering increasing the
rates for international telephone calls in order to keep the
state-owned telecommunications company, PT Indosat, healthy, a
government official has said.

Director General of Post and Telecommunications Sasmito Dirdjo
said on Monday the cost for Indosat, which manages international
telephone communications, to operate an outgoing call was much
higher than its revenue from domestic users due to the sharp
depreciation of the rupiah.

"If the operation costs exceed the income -- and I suspect
it's going to be that way in October -- we may have to increase
the rates," Sasmito told reporters.

He said Indosat and the ministry would discuss with members of
the House of Representatives before it proposed the rate hike to
the Minister of Communications Giri Suseno Hadihardjono for
approval.

The president of publicly listed company Indosat, Tjahjono
Soerjodibroto, said on Monday the collapse of the rupiah had left
Indonesia's international telephone call rates much lower than
other countries'.

For every minute, Indosat charged between 35 U.S. cents and 40
cents, but had to pay about 50 cents to 55 cents to foreign
telecommunications companies, he said.

Tjahjono said the company could still survive because the
outgoing calls traffic was considerably lighter than the incoming
calls, so that the company could cover the losses.

"But if the tariffs remain at the current level, we could soon
collapse if the traffic reverses," he said.

The government last increased the tariff for international
telephone calls, by 25 percent, early this year to take into
account the sharp depreciation of the rupiah against the U.S.
dollar. But the rupiah has continued to fall since then and the
25 percent increase is no longer considered sufficient to cover
the cost.

The rupiah has dropped by about 75 percent against the U.S.
greenback since August last year, causing Indosat's international
communications dollar-denominated costs to rise dramatically.

The company's providers, such as the U.S. AT&T and Japan's NTT
charge in dollars while Indosat's revenues are in rupiah. (das)