Telkom Kenya fights back with lowest on-net tariffs

TELKOM Kenya has taken the initiative in the on-going mobile telephony war in the country by announcing the lowest on-net tariff of Sh2, and slashed its off-net tariff to Sh4 for its GSM customers.

The new tariff also comes with an additional benefit of free calls from 10 am – 5 pm for only Ksh 100 top-up per month across all Orange networks such as Orange mobile, Orange wireless and Telkom Fixed (landline).

Telkom Kenya said this was in recognition of the revision of interconnection rates by the Communications Commission of Kenya.

Announcing the slash in rates and other benefits in Nairobi today, Telkom Kenya CEO Mickael Ghossein said: “Effective today midnight, both our Orange GSM post and pre-paid customers will enjoy new call and SMS rates of Ksh 2.00 per minute for calls and Kshs 1 for SMS, whereas calls to other networks will be charged at Ksh 4/- per minute and Ksh 2/- per SMS respectively”.

Ghossein said his company would “continue to maintain a strong focus on strengthening our distribution and network capability with a view to ensuring that our customers consistently enjoy value for money through provision of reliable and quality services”.

He confirmed that the new tariffs were developed in tandem with Telkom Kenya’s integrated business model, saying Telkom Kenya would soon announce new tariffs for its Orange Wireless and Telkom Fixed (landline).

Ghossein said his network was not keen on mere price wars.

“We do not intend to engage in price wars since our strategy is clear on providing value for our customers, better customer care and quality of service. Despite the current market frenzy, Orange is determined to keep leadership in data and value-added services’,” he said.

As a local company partnered with France Telecom – a global communications player of acclaim – Ghossein said Telkom Kenya was committed to the development and sustainability of the Kenyan market, as the upcoming hub for regional telecommunication and has therefore taken a long term view of the industry in rolling out its business model.

He promised Orange would keep its focus on growing its bouquet of unique value-added products and services to its customers as a one-stop shop (fixed, mobile and internet services).

“With our extensive national coverage of infrastructure which carries voice and data, our customers should rest assured that we will continue to give them better integrated services at the most competitive price,” he said.

Ghossein confirmed that Telkom Kenya had officially expressed its reservations with the CCK’s decision to set the interconnection rate for fixed lines with GSM at Ksh 1.67 on the basis that it was too low to be sustainable, and did not take into consideration running costs as well as network maintenance costs.

Last week rival network Zain Kenya slashed its call rates by 50% to all networks in Kenya.

Brian Adero in Nairobi