Airtel, Vodafone Idea and Reliance Jio have all announced tariffs hikes to combat rising losses

• The tariff hike Airtel and Vodafone Idea are as much as 50%.
  
• Reliance Jio is yet to announce its new plans but reports suggest the cost may rise 40%.
  
• As all key players hike tariff, Jio may still end up being the cheapest of the lot due to the existing gap.

India’s leading telecom operators Airtel, Vodafone Idea and Reliance Jio have all announced tariffs hikes to combat rising losses. While Airtel and Vodafone Idea have already revealed details of new plans, Reliance Jio has only revealed that tariffs will be hiked by 40%.

Airtel and Vodafone Idea’s new plans will go live from midnight on December 3. Reliance Jio’s new plans will go live on December 6.

Airtel users can queue existing plans for a period of up to one year, while Jio has no such limit. You could essentially continue to use existing plans on Airtel for the next one year, and seemingly for an infinite period on Jio. Vodafone does not allow users to queue any plans at the moment.

New tariffs at a glance

Airtel

Airtel has hiked its tariffs from anywhere between ₹0.50 to ₹2.22 per day. This translates to an increase in prices from ₹14 to ₹699.

However, for most of the users, the effective increase in prices will end up between ₹140 and ₹190 for 84 days. Essentially, while the price hike might seem a bit too much on a per recharge basis, it doesn’t seem a lot when you consider the per day increase.

It is worth noting that like Reliance Jio, even Airtel has imposed a fair usage policy (FUP) on outgoing calls to non-Airtel numbers. After crossing the FUP, Airtel users will have to pay ₹0.6 per minute, just like Jio. However, Airtel has not announced the FUP minutes as of now.

Vodafone Idea

Vodafone Idea is amongst the worst-hit post the recent Supreme Court judgment which ordered telecom operators to clear their dues. Vodafone Idea has posted a loss of ₹50,000 crore in the previous quarter – the highest-ever quarterly loss posted by an Indian company so far.

The most popular plans these days offer 1-1.5GB of 4G data per day. Like Airtel, Vodafone Idea has increased the prices of these plans to ₹599 for 84 days. The annual plans now start at ₹1,499, but if you want a 1.5GB/day annual plan, you will have to shell out ₹2,399, which works out to ₹200 per month.

Unlike Airtel, Vodafone Idea has announced a FUP for off-net voice calls. Essentially, you get 1000 minutes of free off-net voice calls after which you will be charged at ₹0.6 per minute.

Reliance Jio

While Reliance Jio has not revealed its plan details at the moment, it has revealed that it will offer up to 300% more benefits with a price hike of up to 40%. Given that Airtel and Vodafone’s prices hikes go up to 50%, and the fact that their old plans were costlier than Jio’s, the new plans from Jio should still be the most affordable.