Leading telecom service provider Airtel, which has been launching new calling and internet packs almost every week, has introduced another lucrative offer, this time related to international roaming further intensifying its fight with the new entrant Reliance Jio's free welcome offer.
Airtel's new 10-day International Roaming (IR) pack offers unlimited incoming calls (except in UAE), 2GB Internet, 250 minutes of outgoing call time (to India) and 100 SMS/per day.
Also read: Reliance Jio free welcome offer after-effect: Vodafone waives off national roaming fee in India
"We are delighted to introduce the new 10-day validity pack for International Roaming and provide added flexibility to customers. These affordable packs will enable users to now stay connected 24x7 without having to worry about high call and data charges while roaming on international networks," Ajai Puri, Director – Market Operations (India & South Asia), Bharti Airtel, said in a statement.
The announcement comes just after Airtel declared the results of its revenue growth in September quarter (Q2). September, which apparently has slowed compared to previous quarter.
Airtel without directly mentioning Reliance Jio by name, said their mobile business experienced a slowdown in growth due to free services being offered by a new operator.
Read more: Bharti Airtel admits to Reliance Jio effect on Q2 results
It's not just Airtel, other incumbent players such Vodafone, Idea, Aircel too are facing the heat from Reliance Jio's free welcome offer, which is kind of predatory in nature.
With reports of Reliance Jio planning to extend the free trial offer till March 2017, we believe rivals, in their bid to contain their subscribers from migrating to new telecom service, will offer more lucrative internet and calling packages.
Watch this space for more updates.
Airtel's new 10-day IR pack details:
Benefits/Country | Singapore | Thailand | US-Canada | UK | UAE |
Pack Rental | 1199 | 1199 | 2999 | 2999 | 2999 |
Incoming calls | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited | 250 |
Data | 2GB | 2GB | 2GB | 2GB | 2GB |
Free mins. to India | 250 | 250 | 250 | 250 | 250 |
SMS – India | 100/ day | 100/ day | 100/ day | 100/ day | 100/day |
Data – post pack benefits(Rs/MB) | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 |
Outgoing – India (Rs/min) | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 10 |