Mobile Tariff Hike:
Bharti Airtel, the country’s second largest telecom operator, has hinted at increasing mobile tariffs and said that the tariff needs to be fixed. In an earnings call with investors after the fourth quarter results of the financial year 2023-24 ere announced, Bharti Airtel MD Gopal Vittal said that tariffs need to be repaired to improve the return ratio and it does not matter which technology improves the ratio.
Gopal Vittal said that Bharti Airtel has managed to add RS. 16 average revenue per user (ARPU) in the financial year 2023-24, which is the highest among all telecom companies. Earlier, at the end of the financial year, the ARPU was RS.193, which has now increased to RS.208. During this time, the company has emphasized on increasing tariffs by the entire industry.
In recent times, many brokerage houses and investment companies have also predicted an increase in mobile tariffs after the announcement of the results of the Lok Sabha elections on June 4, 2024. BofA Securities has recently released a research paper on increasing mobile tariffs may increase by 20 to 25 percent. The brokerage house said that the increase in tariffs will invest in high-margin fiber broadband enterprise/data center offerings.
Telecom companies have not increased mobile tariffs since November 2021. According to BofA, we believe that this time all telecom companies will increase tariffs as s last seen in November 2021. The report said that due to lack of any option, customers can easily bear a tariff hike of 20 to 25 percent. The report said that once the tariff is hiked and customers get used to it, then after 12 months, companies can increase the tariff again to recoup the investment made on 5G.