How telcos charged you in 2017

What you need to know:

The report shows that both companies reduced their on-network and off-network tariffs between first quarter ended in March 2017 to the last quarter that ended in December 2017

Dar es Salaam. Airtel Tanzania and Benson subscribers enjoyed reduced voice call tariffs last year, the Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA) quarterly communication statistics for the fourth quarter of 2017 shows.

The report shows that both companies reduced their on-network and off-network tariffs between first quarter ended in March 2017 to the last quarter that ended in December 2017.

According to the report, Airtel Tanzania reduced its on-network tariff to Sh219 per minute as at December compared with Sh225 charged as at March 2017, while its off-network tariff also went down to Sh361 as at December last year from Sh384 per minute at March.

Benson, which is the cheapest network in Tanzania in both local and international voice tariffs, reduced its on-network tariff to Sh60 as at December from Sh84 as at March while the off-network tariff went down to Sh150 as at December 2017 from Sh210 as at March.

Subscribers for other networks including Vodacom, Halotel, Tigo, TTCL and Zantel had no relief as their tariff for on-network voice remained flat.

Their off-network remained unchanged during last year except for Vodacom Tanzania.

Vodacom Tanzania, which has the largest market share, charged Sh270 last year for on-network voice tariff, but managed to reduce its off-network charges to Sh330 as at December 2017 from Sh338 as at March.

Halotel Tanzania on-network tariff remained at Sh228 while off-network voice tariff was also flat at Sh228 during the whole last year while Tigo on-network tariff remained at Sh261 and off-network was flat at Sh348.

The report shows that TTCL on-network voice tariff remained flat at Sh154 while its off-network voice tariff did not change at Sh274 and Zantel on-network tariff was the same at Sh157 while its off-network was Sh249 per minute.

On East African tariffs, Benson made major reduction to Sh198 per minute as at December 2017 from Sh435 charged as at March while Airtel Tanzania and Tigo rates remained flat at Sh750 and Sh739 respectively.

Vodacom voice tariff for East African also remained flat at Sh719 during the period under review, while Zantel also did not change its tariffs as they remained at Sh1,020.

Tanzania Telecommunication Company Limited increased its East Africa voice tariff to Sh650 as of December last year from Sh600 recorded as of March while Halotel dramatically increased to Sh1,033 as at December last year from Sh750 as at March 2017.