Two of the biggest network operators in India, Bharti Airtel, and Idea Cellular have recently announced that the incoming calls on their network while on national roaming will be free of cost. Airtel had already made this announcement and became the first network to make roaming calls cost-free.
The statement from Airtel read:
Death of National Roaming – Airtel announces Free Incoming calls/SMS and No Premium on Outgoing Calls while Roaming across India; no more data roaming charges. No Bill Shocks while Roaming Overseas – daily billing will be automatically adjusted to the price of basic one day pack even for customers who don’t buy a roaming pack.
Now, Idea Cellular also has taken a similar approach. The release from the company read:
“Effective 1 April, 2017, Idea’s 200 million customers will enjoy free incoming calls while roaming on company’s 2G, 3G and 4G network across 400,000 towns and villages in the country. Idea customers will be able to make outgoing calls, SMS freely at affordable rates while roaming anywhere in India,”
Here are the key takeaways from this.
- Incoming calls will be free while on national roaming
- No special data charges, the normal data balance will be used
- The new rules about national roaming are for both, Prepaid and Postpaid users
- Outgoing calls are going to be chargeable, on normal call rates
- Outgoing SMS will be chargeable
- You don’t have to subscribe to any plan for it as it will be a pan-India rule from both networks
While Idea didn’t announce anything as such, Bharti Airtel says that for Postpaid users, daily billing will be adjusted to the price of basic one day pack when the user is on International roaming is not buying a pack.
Idea is instead giving some packs for International roaming customers. These packs include free bundled usage of up to 400 outgoing minutes, 100 SMSes per day, 3GB bundled data and unlimited incoming calls for Rs 2,499 for Asia, and Rs 5,999 for Europe for 30 days validity.
Check: Airtel 345 Recharge Details | Idea 346 Recharge Details
For both the networks, the free incoming calls on National roaming starts from April 1st, the same date when Jio’s paid services begin and the Happy New Year offer ends. Reliance Jio has been offering free calls and has already mentioned that Jio calls will be free for always, both outgoing and incoming anywhere in the country.
In a bid to counter Jio’s offers, both the operators are giving special recharge options where the users are offered 1GB of data per day for 28 days and that is for the price of Rs. 345 to Rs. 349 per month.
