Mystery network caller angers True Move

Athueck Asvanand, vice chairman of True Corp, the parent of True Move, said last week the company wants to protect its network from being contacted by what he calls illegal numbers.

True Move has also lost interconnection fee income from this unknown network, he said.

Local mobile phone numbers usually have 10-digits, but True Move recently found calls using 11 digits on its network from time to time.

The numbers begin with '0', followed by the usual '0' prefix and nine digits.

Prasert Apipunya, deputy secretary-general of National Telecommunications Commission (NTC), said the 11-digit numbers have been used since April not only to call customers of True Move but also Advanced Info Service (AIS) and Total Access Communication (DTAC).

The NTC is gathering evidence but he declined to elaborate.

The network that uses the 11-digit-numbers will be fined, as it has not been assigned them by the NTC.

The NTC has already ordered one state telecom enterprise to inquire with its cellular service joint venture about the case.

Narupon Rattanasamaharn, vice president for regulatory affairs at CAT, said CAT received the NTC's directive last month and then informally asked Hutchison-CAT Wireless Multimedia about whether it was providing its service with 11-digit numbers.

Hutch denied engaging in such a practice, he said.

Early last year Hutch claimed that its customers had trouble calling AIS customers. AIS responded by saying it would file a charge with the NTC over Hutch's "dumping" its airtime rates, a move it said was straining other networks.

Last March Hutch asked the Civil Court for an injunction against AIS' "blocking" of calls from Hutch's customers. AIS countersued, claiming libel damages of Bt45 billion. Both soon withdrew their lawsuits.

The interconnection fee is what a receiving network collects for handling a call from the originating network.

AIS, DTAC and True Move agreed two years ago to charge Bt1 per minute for interconnections.

CAT and Hutch have yet to reach an interconnection agreement with any networks.

Last year both proposed to pay 21 satang per minute but the three major cellular networks rejected the rate, saying it was too low.