Number portability to cost below Rs 300

Consumers in all likelihood will not have to pay more than Rs 300 to change from one mobile service provider to another while keeping the phone number intact, a facility likely to start from September 20.

"It will be one time cost for subscribers seeking portability but the charge is not yet finalised by the DoT and TRAI, on which they are working. So far, it seems the charges would not be more than Rs 300 but this could be even below Rs 200," sources close to the developments told PTI.

Deliberations by the government is being carried out to keep cost and charges at a level so as not to discourage subscribers willing to change their service provider, an optional facility, and at the same time make the service providers a viable business model, they said.

The charge is directly linked to the number of subscribers who would seek the change in service provider out of the total mobile user base of about 400 million. The DoT has offered licence to Syniverse Technologies for north and western region and MNP Interconnection Telecom Ltd for eastern and southern region to rollout number portability across the country.

There is no comparable market in the 50-60 countries which has adopted number portability as the pre-paid subscriber base in the country is almost 90 per cent of the total subscriber base and has low ARPU (average revenue per user).