Broadband, international calls cheaper - inflation wonks
Telecommunications bucks the upward CPI trend - but things are not quite as they seem.
Figures released this morning showed a modest 0.4% increase in inflation for the September quarter.
Telecommunications bucked the trend. The cost of services - long static (see graphic below) - took a sudden 3.5% dip.
Statistics NZ pinned the decline on higher broadband caps, which allow people to download more internet content for the same money, and cheaper international calling rates.
(Click to zoom)
The quarter saw market leader Telecom drop international calling rates to multiple countries - although, as NBR pointed out, some rates, such as mobile calls to Australia, were increased.
And a significant tweak to the way Telecom charges for international calls, introduced at the same time, could actually lead to higher charges. Calls will now be rounded up to the nearest minute, rather than being charged by the second after the first minute.
An industry insider told NBR, "The general rule is that move to minute+minute from minute+second represents a 20% - 25% revenue increase."
For the 12 months to June 30, 2011, Statistics NZ's ISP Survey found 717,000 New Zealanders had a data cap between 5 gigabytes (GB) and 20GB, up from 501,000 the year before.
411,000 had a data cap between 20GB and 50GB, up from 175,000.
30,000 had a data cap above 50GB, up from 19,000.
The number with no data cap - less than 1% of the internet population - fell to 22,000 from 90,000 the year before.
Prices fell 4.8% in the sweeping "computers and audio visual equipment" category.
NBR staff
Tue, 25 Oct 2011
Tue, 25 Oct 2011
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Broadband, international calls cheaper - inflation wonks
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