ISDN effecting ADSL pricing

[biltonguy]

Hi everyone

Been reading this forum for about a year now and finally joined!

My question/comment is about ISDN.... I use 64k isdn. Rental, ISP, call charges and infinicall cost me about R400 - R450pm, thats connecting almost daily (after 7pm of course ). Now the cheapest ADSL option is the 192k package, with isp costs its about R600pm. There is no way im paying R600pm for 192k, but if the price were to drop to below R500 I would glady eat it up - its 3x faster than my current 64k and its always-on (not happy about 3 gig cap but ill live with it).

Im sure a lot of other isdn users feel the same way. ISDN would surely fall away if the 192k adsl package dropped below R500pm (all inclusive). Telkom must love isdn, not only do they get R120pm rental, R40pm infinicall, profit from whatever isp you're using, but you pay everytime you dial in!

How important is isdn to telkom? Is it effecting ADSL pricing?

 

[Celemasiko]

In my former days in Germany I had ISDN AND ADSL. That is the solution for the future. Combine analog broadband with the digital technology.

 

[arf9999]

Hi everyone

Been reading this forum for about a year now and finally joined!



How important is isdn to telkom? Is it effecting ADSL pricing?

Welcome.

It seems likely that Telkom's slow rollout and crippled, super high priced ADSL offerings are directly linked to the protection of their ISDN and diginet business.

 

[BucK]

Interesting...

 

[MaD]

Welcome.

It seems likely that Telkom's slow rollout and crippled, super high priced ADSL offerings are directly linked to the protection of their ISDN and diginet business.

And Diginet.. the massively bloated overpriced behemoth from Telkom's stable of ripoffs. Telkom are protecting their investment in both dialup and corporate markets..

I mean, how thick is that to invest hundreds of millions in ISDN when ADSL was out for years abroad already?

Probably purposely - to make money off per-minute charges, instead of fixed rate with flat-rate access via ADSL..

 

[Gatecrasher]

I have no doubt that Telkom's biggest cash cow is their local call charges. These cost them virtually nothing. That's why they could offer infinitycall. That's why local calls (in the 80's) used to be a fixed cost regardless of duration...that is...before they figured they could make an absolute killing from internet surfing. That is why in many parts of the world, local calls are free.

So it is completely logical in my view that the greatest barrier to reducing ADSL charges is the cost of local calls. Because the latter is such a juicy ripoff, the former has to be a ripoff too, to avoid a mass exodus from the more lucrative and more prevalent ISDN and dial-up internet usage.

 

[Gaz{M}]

The problem is that Telkom has over 600 000 ISDN subscribers. Now i bet that most of these people spend in excess of R1000 a month on their lines, way more than many ADSL subscribers. So yes, ISDN infrastructure is a HUGE barrier in the way of cheaper DSL. It's a R600 mill a month cash cow... <moo>

 

[antowan]

builtonguy

We did mention this "crippling" of services to ICASA and asked them to investigate. I did so specifically in my presentation to them and pointed to examples.

Telkom cripples their new tech because they make more money with the older tech...

Cheers
Antowan

 

[Strobemeister]

Exactly right ant, i'm using isdn128, mainly for the cap. Once they do away with that, and drop their dsl prices to acceptable levels, i'll change to dsl.