The Commerce Commission has confirmed 2degrees’ suspicion that the final leg of mobile termination rate regulation – and with it the promise of cheaper cellphone calls – will drag into next year.

2degrees is celebrating the government’s decision – long flagged, but formalised this morning – to regulate mobile termination rates (MTR).

The multi-sided regulatory brawl over MTR (what a phone company charges a rival to connect a customer’s call txt to its network) has lasted more than seven brain-melting years.

There was a seething sea of comments after NBR's story on Vodafone withdrawing its $12 Talk offer yesterday – widely seen as a last-minute manoeuvre to avoid mobile market regulation.