Telecome giants Reliance jio has made a major announcement that it will stop charging its customers for off-net or Jio to non-Jio voice calls. Jio announced that due to the abolition of interconnect usage charges (IUC) charges by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), it is waving off the charges for off-net or Jio to non-Jio calls.

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The company said that “Honouring its commitment to revert off-net domestic voice-call charges to zero, as soon as IUC charges are abolished, Jio will once again make all off-net domestic voice calls free, starting 1 January 2021. On-net domestic voice calls have always been free on the Jio network”.

“Jio is committed to lay the foundation of a digital society a society where everything, everyone everywhere is connected with the best quality service, at the lowest price globally, and has access to the most advanced digital platforms. Through technological innovation, Jio will continue to deliver revolutionary products and services to its users, with a customer-first approach,” Jio said in a statement.

The new change would make the Jio subscribers happy because until now, Jio gave 300 to 12,000 FUP minutes depending on the price of the Jio recharge plans.

“Through technological innovation, Jio will continue to deliver revolutionary products and services to its users, with a customer-first approach.”

For context, in September 2019, when TRAI extended the timeline for implementation of the Bill & Keep regime beyond 1 January 2020, Jio was left with no option but to start charging its customers for off-net voice calls, at a rate exactly equivalent to the applicable IUC charge.

While doing so, Jio had assured its users that this charge would continue only till the time TRAI abolished IUC charges.

Over the last year or so, Reliance Jio was charging customers 6 paise per minute for voice calls made to rival phone networks, but compensated subscribers by giving free data of equal value.

Reliance Jio, which added an overall 2.22 million new mobile customers, taking its total subscriber base to 406.3 million during October.

In the wireline segment, Reliance Jio added the most subscribers at 2,45,912. It was followed by Bharti Airtel which added 48,397 fixed-line connections, VIL with 9,400 subscriber addition, and Quadrant which added 5,198 customers.

Mean-while, Vodafone, on the other hand, has been sending out messages to its subscribers about the discontinuation of the 3G services for a while now. A Gadgets 360 report has also confirmed that Vi is all set to shut its 3G services. Subscribers who did not upgrade their SIM to 4G will get voice calling through 2G. This means that the data services will not be available on the old sim connections.

Have a look at the Reliance jio recharge plan 2020: List of Jio Prepaid Plans, Offers, Price, Data, & Validity

Jio Prepaid Recharge Plan Data Benefit Validity Jio to Jio calls Jio-to non-Jio calls SMS
Rs 98 2GB 28 Days Unlimited IUC 6 paise/min 300
Rs 129 2GB 28 Days Unlimited 1000 min 300
Rs 149 1GB per Day 24 Days Unlimited 300 min 100/Day
Rs 199 1.5GB per Day 28 Days Unlimited 1000 min 100/Day
Rs 249 2GB per Day 28 Days Unlimited 1000 min 100/Day
Rs 329 6GB 84 Days Unlimited 3000 min 100/Day
Rs 349 3GB per Day 28 Days Unlimited 1000 min 100/Day
Rs 399 1.5GB per Day 56 Days Unlimited 2000 min 100/Day
Rs 444 2GB per Day 56 Days Unlimited 2000 min 100/Day
Rs 555 1.5GB per Day 84 Days Unlimited 3000 min 100/Day
Rs 599 2GB per Day 84 Days Unlimited 3000 min 100/Day
Rs 1299 24GB 336 Days Unlimited 12,000 min 100/Day
Rs 2121 1.5GB per Day 336 Days Unlimited 12,000 min 100/Day
Rs 4999 350GB 360 Days Unlimited 12,000 min 100/Day