Airtel Starts Charging Extra for VOIP Calls Made Via Viber,Skype etc

Airtel, Indian Telecom network, has given a bad start for the upcoming new year. It has started charging extra for VOIP calls which are made via various services like Viber, Skype, Facebook Messenger and other similar apps. Earlier, VOIP calls were not differentiated and it was part of single data plan.

Airtel will start charging 4p / 10 KB (3G service) and 10p / 10 KB (2G service) for VOIP Calling. We will help you analyse how this will impact you.

Considering the fact that VOIP calling via 2G is almost impossible task, we will analyze the cost involved in VOIP calling via 3G.

How much VOIP calling will cost you ?

If you are using a good quality VOIP service like Viber or Skype and also assuming that the codecs used by these companies is G.729, then considering the inbound and outbound requests made for data packs, the user uses 0.50 mb of data per minute.

Calculations are as per below :

Total Data used in VOIP calling per minute : 0.50 mb, i.e., 500 KB.

Cost of VOIP data(Of Airtel) : 4paise/10 KB.

Total Cost of data per minute of VOIP Calling : (500 KB x 4p) Divided by 10 = 200 paise = Rs. 2

So you will be charged Rs. 2 per minute for VOIP calling using a good VOIP Services from Airtel. This is costlier than normal STD Call rates, incase you are using VOIP for calling within the country, and at par with rates for international calling rates of other companies

Earlier TRAI had rejected the proposal of telecom operators to charge consumers for using apps like Whatsapp, Viber etc. This time too, TRAI should step in and stop operators charging extra as this is against the Net-Neutrality.

What are your views? Will Other operators charge follow Airtel ? Do you think in future, they will charge extra for Video streaming, audio streaming etc ? Share your thoughts in comments.