Airtel, Jio and Vodafone Idea push long-term plans at old rates to retain users
Especially for 365-day plans priced between ₹2,545 and ₹3,099, Bharti Airtel, Reliance Jio and Vodafone Idea (Vi) are running in-app promotions for customers to save by recharging early. «Clearly, there has been a substantial spike in daily volume of recharges for all spectrums of validity and all three telecom companies are advertising through in-app promotions, the offline retail network as well as payment aggregators,» a telecom company executive said.
Paytm, the largest mobile recharge medium for telcos beyond their own apps, said it has seen a 15-20% increase in daily recharges on its platform. «There is also an increased preference for long-term plans,» a spokesperson said.
Airtel, Jio, Vi as well as payments platforms GPay and PhonePe did not respond to ET's emailed queries before going to press on Monday.
Analysts said while the strategy will cause recharges at the lower prices, thus making telcos forego the hiked amounts, it will also make subscribers to stick for at least a year with the operator. But some of them also raised doubts about the effectiveness of this offer since, historically, telecom users have mostly opted for plans that are for shorter periods.
«I am sure there will be anecdotal instances where subscribers will want to recharge in this 4-5 days' window to save costs,» said Balaji Subramanian, vice-president at stock research firm IIFL Securities. «However, the number of subscribers who have the propensity to recharge for 365 days is very low. For instance, for Airtel and Vodafone
