Published October 6, 2008

Asean may cut mobile roaming fees by half in '09

Email this article
Print article
Feedback

(KUALA LUMPUR) Roaming fees for mobile phone users in South-east Asia making calls outside their own country may be cut by half early next year, according to a newspaper report on Saturday citing a Malaysian minister.

Energy, Water and Communications Minister Shaziman Abu Mansor said a reduction was necessary as charges were exceptionally high.

'We plan to reduce roaming charges with Singapore first,' he was quoted as saying by the Sunday Star newspaper.

Mr Shaziman said his counterparts from Asean had agreed to the plan during a meeting on Indonesia's resort island of Bali last month.

'Reducing the roaming rates will also reduce the burden on the tens of thousands of Malaysians who commute to Singapore daily,' he said.

'We do not want them to be paying exceptionally high roaming charges when their workplace (Singapore) is only a few kilometres away from their homes in (neighbouring) Johor,' he added.

Mr Shaziman said his Singaporean counterpart Lee Boon Yang had hailed the proposal.

Malaysia's top mobile operator Maxis charges RM1.50 (S$0.62) per minute for a local registered cell-phone user when he uses his phone in Singapore and as high as RM9 per minute in Cambodia.



For local calls Maxis charges about 30 sen per minute. -- AFP