Vodafone Idea has reduced the price of its minimum recharge plan to Rs 20 as a means to avoid subscribers jumping ship to other service providers. The news comes almost a year after operators started levying incoming call charges on SIMs that are not recharged regularly.
The latest change in Vodafone’s minimum recharge plan means users have to recharge for Rs 20 instead of Rs 35 to avoid deactivation of their SIM card for incoming as well as outgoing calls, sources close to the development told ET Telecom.
However, there’s a catch. While the previous minimum recharge plan of Rs 35 gave users 30 days of outgoing call benefits, the latest Rs 20 recharge will only be valid for 28 days. It’s unclear as for how long will Vodafone keep offering incoming calls on a SIM if a minimum recharge plan isn’t done on time.
Sources close to the development said that the move comes as a means to make the “current crop of inactive customers active” by getting them to take the new minimum recharge plan of Rs 20 instead of Rs 35.
Airtel also levies a minimum recharge of Rs 35 to offer outgoing call services for 30 days and incoming call facilities for 45 days. Jio, on the other hand, offers its cheapest plan for Rs 98 for a validity of 28 days. Jio’s plan, however, comes with unlimited calls, 300 SMS and 2GB total data.
Before this, Vodafone Idea announced TurboNet 4G networks for increased 4G coverage, more capacity, turbo speed and lower latency in select cities of UP West, Rajasthan and Rest of Bengal. The operator recently started offering freebies on all prepaid recharges including unlimited calls, cashback, extra data and caller tune.