KARACHI, Nov 29: The Pakistan Telecommunication Company has decided not to increase the monthly charges for digital cross connect (DXX) network for internet service providers using shared bandwidth, ranging between 192 kilobits per second and two megabits per second.

The PTCL general manager of public relations, Sultan Ahmed Hasan, told Dawn from Islamabad that the relief in tariff bandwidth would be applicable from May 2000.

He added that the bandwidth tariff would remain the same as applicable to other types of internet protocol connectivity.

At a press conference in Islamabad on April 22, 2000, the minister for science and technology, Prof Attaur Rehman, had announced that “the DXX charges, which were previously Rs219,000 per month, will now be charged at a flat rate of Rs55,000 per month for data rates of 192 kilobits per second and above”.

He added that the new tariff would come into effect from May 1, 2000.

However, the Islamabad-based senior accounts officer of the international telecommunication department did not inform the Karachi-based value-added services department that the DXX charges were not applicable to the ISPs employing shared bandwidth. As a result, the value-added services department not only continued to issue new demand notes at the previous rates but also did not intimate the ISPs using shared bandwidth that DXX charges were not Rs55,000 per month.

The senior accounts officer of the international telecommunication department made matters worse by not issuing a bill to the 19 ISPs using shared bandwidth for the past 18 months.

A chief executive officer of an ISP said that the 19 ISPs that had been affected by the lack of coordination of the PTCL would now heave a sigh of relief.