Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on Friday reduced the access facilitation charges (AFC) for submarine cable landing stations. This will result in reduction in the price of International Private Leased Circuits (IPLC) for BPOs/ Call Centers, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and other information technology enabled service providers.
 
Operators will now pay Rs 36,000 per annum for low capacity STM-1 and Rs 6.25 lakh for high capacity STM-64 per unit capacity at the cable landing station, Trai said in 'International Telecommunication Cable Landing Stations Access Facilitation Charges and Co-Location Charges Regulations, 2012'.
 
Access Facilitation Charges (AFC) are the charges, which are payable by International Long Distance Operators (ILDO)/ Internet Service Providers (ISP) to the owner of the cable landing station to access the acquired international bandwidth in a submarine cable. Submarine cables provide vital international telecommunication links between countries across the world. Submarine cables terminate in the country through cable landing stations.
 
TRAI had issued ‘International Telecommunication Access to Essential Facility at Cable Landing Station Regulations’ on 7 June, 2007. In 2007, with approval of the Authority owner of cable landing stations published the AFC (a) when access is provided at Cable Landing Station and (b) At alternate location when space is not available at CLS.
 
With a view to align AFC with current cost and utilization, TRAI issued consultation paper on 22 March, 2012. On the basis of cost data submitted by service providers, TRAI estimated Access Facilitation Charges and issued a consultation paper on “Estimation of Access Facilitation Charges and Co-location Charges at Cable Landing Stations” on 19 October, 2012 for further comments/counter comments of stakeholders.