010107: Telcos start year with cheap call rates

P.L.D.T. TARGETS OVERSEAS FILIPINO

WORKERS AND THEIR FAMILIES

By Lenie Lectura

Reporter

TELECOMMUNICATIONS companies are starting the year right by providing cheap overseas phone call rates.          Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) opens the year with a strong range of products targeting overseas Filipino workers (OFW) and their families.   Call to the Middle East via PLDT’s Pwede Card has gone down from P20 per minute to P10.  “We’ve opened up low rates to the Middle East through our Pwede Card,” said Butch Jimenez, head of PLDT’s Retail Business Group.         Pwede Card is a reloadable PIN-based prepaid card that provides access to a combined range of voice and Internet services.            “OFW families that want these low rates can just get our reloadable Pwede Card and use that to call to the Middle East. It is also convenient since they can just reload the card in any of the 800,000 e-load centers of Smart,” Jimenez added.           PLDT has extended to OFW families the low-priced budget card that allows international calls for as low as P3 per minute to major destinations like the United States, Hong Kong and Canada. “Budget Card is now the No. 1 prepaid international calling card in the country, and we look upon this product as our contribution in keeping OFW families connected worldwide,” said Jimenez.   PLDT has also offered OFW families their Telepwede Prepaid Landline for only P115 a month for incoming calls. The phone giant will waive the P1,000 installation fee upon presentation of an OFW’s OWWA card.    “We are certain many OFW families want a landline just so that their loved ones from abroad can call them. OFW families can now get a prepaid landline that allows incoming calls for an affordable monthly fee,” said Jimenez. PLDT expects OFW families to avail themselves of the low rates of calls to major destinations as well as the low- priced landline for incoming calls.    “The best gift we can give OFWs is a cost-efficient way to keep connected to their loved ones. And PLDT wants to be the first to make it happen for them when the new year opens,” Jimenez said.      Jimenez said only PLDT has put an OFW package together that gives low rates worldwide and even provides OFW families with business opportunities.       For OFWs looking for ways to start a business in the Philippines, PLDT myDSL still offers the Internet Café Plus, an all-in-one Internet café package for as low as P35,000 down payment and a monthly fee of just P4,000.  PLDT is targeting about 2,000 Internet café stations up by the first quarter of 2007 from this offer alone.     “We are serious about our promise to help the new heroes of our country. OFWs have sacrificed a lot and are a significant part of our country’s success and PLDT will always be at the forefront of being a part of their lives, just as we have been a significant part of the Filipinos life for over 76 years,” he said.         Mobile phone operators also brought down to $0.20 per minute the call rates to Saudi Arabia, Oman and Qatar.       For 30 days starting today, Smart Communications Inc., Pilipino Telephone Corp., Globe Telecom, Digitel Mobile Philippines Inc. offer a new industry-wide promo to their subscribers.             After January 30, calls to the Middle East will cost $0.40 per minute. The operators said this promo rate was undertaken through the initiative of Sen. Joker P. Arroyo, who heads the Senate public services committee, together with the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC). The move is in line with the government’s efforts to assist Filipino migrant workers and their families.      The Senate requested the NTC in August last year to persuade the telcos to lower the international direct dial (IDD) rates because many OFWs and their families complain that calls to Middle East countries are expensive.         The promotional IDD rate is a timely New Year’s gift to overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), most of whom are deployed in the Middle East, said the phone firms.         Statistics from the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration Labor Assistance Center shows that as of January 27, 2005, 40 percent, or 393,654 of 981,677 OFWs all over the world, are found in the Middle East.

http://www.businessmirror.com.ph/01012007/economy01.html