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Published on December 26, 2007

State telecom agency TOT has been struck a final blow at the end of what has been a very tough year, both legally and financially.

Samart i-Mobile (SIM) has filed a civil lawsuit against TOT and CAT Telecom as joint shareholders of cellular operator Thai Mobile, claiming outstanding fees amounting to Bt1.11 billion for customer service, billing and consulting services.

In addition, SIM is claiming Bt1.53 billion from the two state agencies as additional compensation, including interest on the outstanding fees.

The TOT-CAT joint committee of Thai Mobile decided yesterday to ask the co-shareholders to look into the matter, and the agencies will get together to discuss it today.

SIM said the last time that Thai Mobile had paid its customer-service fee was in August 2006, but that was for the billing cycle of April 2005. The last time it paid the billing fee was in April 2006, but that payment was for October 2004.

SIM stopped providing services to Thai Mobile in June. After it pulled the plug, TOT said it wanted to discuss the outstanding amount, claiming that some contract conditions were "unfair", especially billing at fixed rates.

Thai Mobile, which has about 50,000 subscribers, began services in 2003. It hired Samart in 2002 to handle customer service, billing and distribution of Thai Mobile numbers to dealers.

Already this year, TOT has suffered the loss of its access charges, which are fees charged against the mobile-phone concessionaires of CAT Telecom for connecting to different networks via TOT's facilities. The concessionaires - Total Access Communication (DTAC) and True Move - stopped paying the charge in November 2006 in order, instead, to comply with the interconnection charge regulations of the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC). The access fee is waived in the case of Advanced Info Service (AIS) because its concession is owned by TOT.

TOT recently filed a civil lawsuit against both cellular operators and their concession owner, CAT Telecom, seeking payment of the cumulative access fees, totalling Bt14 billion. It also asked the Central Administrative Court to terminate the NTC's interconnection regulations, which require all telecom operators to share voice and data revenue between the networks involved in calls on a fair basis.

Since it stopped paying the access fee, DTAC has paid the amount of the interconnection fee to TOT by depositing it in a bank, but TOT has declined to accept the payment, so DTAC stopped paying the interconnection fee to TOT in November this year. The fees amount to more than Bt1 billion.

TOT also has a problem with its own licence owner, the NTC.

Lately the commission has declined to accept TOT's appeal for a waiver of overdue phone-number fees from the period between August 2006 and July this year, totalling Bt747 million. The commission has suggested that TOT should seek the waiver from its sole shareholder, the Finance Ministry.

A telecom industry source said that solving TOT's predicament now rests with the new government.

In the wake of its declining revenue, TOT has made plans to improve its business by spending Bt64 billion over the next four years to install a new network with cutting-edge technology to create new services, as well as eliminating 2,000 staff positions to create a leaner operation.

The agency projects revenue of at least Bt63 billion in 2011, up from the forecast of Bt50 billion for this year. Excluding concession revenue, it should record income of Bt38 billion in 2011, up from this year's expected Bt28 billion.

Telecom Reporters

 The Nation