Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday introduced a new international termination rate (ITR), which will take effect from September 1 2022.. This is the second within eight months.
According to the NCC, ITR is the rate for terminating international in-bound traffic, either by International Carriers through international networks to a point of interconnection (PoI) with domestic networks. It represents payments service exports by the Nigerian Domestic Mobile Network Operators.
The new ITR, which is $0.10 (10 cents per minute) as against the earlier $0.045, will still be paid in dollars and operators will receive an increasing rate in Naira terms should devaluation continue as it has been.
On January 1, this year, a termination rate, took effect and was pegged at $0.045 but the announcement was greeted with criticism from stakeholders, especially the International Data Access operators (IDA). They lamented that the rate would cripple their business and make them labour in vain for the MNOs and other international carriers terminating calls on their networks in Nigeria.
Subsequently, the IDAs wrote letters to NCC and petitioned the National Assembly, demanding a review of the rate if they were to remain in business.
In a new document released yesterday, and signed by the Executive Vice Chairman, NCC, Prof. Umar Danbatta, entitled: ‘Determination of Mobile (Voice) International Termination Rate (As Amended) Issued by the NCC and dated August 25, 2022,” the Commission agreed, after various consultations that there were indeed post-implementation challenges, which necessitated the need for further engagements with relevant stakeholders.
The document read in part: “This determination shall take effect from 1st of September 2022 and will remain valid and binding on licensees until further reviewed by the Commission. This determination effectively repeals the Determination of Voice (Mobile) International Termination Rate issued by the NCC on 25th November, 2021 which took effect from 1st of January, 2022.
According to NCC, the Nigerian Transit Carriers/IDAs shall terminate in-bound international calls in the network of domestic operators at a discount of 21 per cent on the $0.10.
The commission said the discount is based on the same asymmetric corridor contained in its MTR’s Determination of 2018.
“ITR for voice services paid by overseas carriers for terminating international calls on local networks in Nigeria shall be $0.10. The $0.10 is fixed price for ITR services, the ITR will be paid in dollars so operators will receive an increasing rate in naira terms should devaluation continue. ITR in dollars only pertains to the cost of bringing traffic into Nigeria. Operators will continue to pay the regulated MTR,” the document added.