The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has fixed call rate at N50 per minute for closed user group (CUG) service and barred telcos from data bundling on the telecoms plan.
The rate takes effect from November 1, 2023.
Service providers such as MTN, Glo, Airtel and 9mobile offer CUG services that allow enrolled customer group members to enjoy lower call rates and free on-net calls by paying monthly access fees.
Apart from banning data bundles on CUG plans, telcos are now restricted to providing voice calls and text messages only on the telecom plan.
“CUG rental/access fee must not be bundled with data, VAS or other ancillary services,” Executive Vice Chairman, NCC, Pro Garba Danbatta said in the new rules effective November 1, 2023.
“The price cap for voice shall be N50/min for voice and N4 per SMS. The minimum access fee for prepaid and postpaid CUG services shall be N400, while the maximum shall be N500,” NCC said.
The regulator ruled that all calls and text messages within a CUG (on net) shall not be below the rate of N0.50 per minute for voice services and N1.02 for text messages while all calls outside the CUG (off net) shall not be below the price floor of N6.40 per minute for voice services and N1.02 for text messages, according to technologytimes.ng.
NCC which also restricted CUG services to six subscriber categories and set the limit of phone lines that can be allocated to the respective groups also decreed that a “CUG offering must have a minimum of three mobile station international subscriber directory number (MSISDNS) subscribers.”
Prof Danbatta said the six subscriber categories and their maximum phone line limits include large corporate organisations-30,000, government agencies-20,000, not for profit organisations-10,000, duly registered residential estate associations-2,000, and micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs)-200.
He said the underlined documents are mandatory and must be submitted before they are registered for CUG services in the respective categories below: large corporate organizations, NGOs and MSMEs.
Business registration document (certificate of incorporation or certificate of registration or certificate of trustees); Provision of tax identification number (TIN); signed contract agreement between the organisation and the telco; proof of identification of members within the CUG; the NIN of two company representatives either C-level director, CEO or board member/trustees; a request for the service shall be signed by two company representatives either C-level director, CEO or board member/trustees on the letterhead of the organisation.
