Viettel has issued the official statement of applying the roaming charge among three Indochinese countries equivalent to the domestic charge since 01 January 2017. And thus, Viettel has implemented its commitments before the requests of the Prime Ministers of the three Indochina countries, while it has become the first telecom corporation in the world which applies contact rates including calls, messages and web surfing between Viettel (Vietnam) - Metfone (Cambodia) - Unitel (Laos) as the same as the domestic rates. With this new calculation, when Viettel’s customers are roaming and making calls in the Indochina region, they will be reduced over 13 times compared with the international calling rates in the region, down to 160 times for the data rate and 10 times for the message charge.

Specifically, for outbound international Voice/Message Services, when customers of Viettel are calling/messaging to customers of Metfone - Cambodia or Unitel – Laos, they will not be charged for the normal internal calling/messaging, the rate is now only VND2,000/minute (the former rate of VND3,600/minute), message charge of VND500/message (the former rate of VND2,500/message).

For customers who are moving to Laos or Cambodia and roaming on Metfone or Unitel, the charges of calling, messaging and data are nearly similar with the rates in Vietnam. Moreover, customers will be entitled 100% free for receiving the international call charges, rather than previously they had to pay VND4,840/minute. Those customers who are roaming into Unitel - Laos or Metfone – Cambodia and calling to Unitel/Metfone subscribers or calling back to Vietnam to Viettel subscribers shall pay only VND2,000/minute, a decrease of over 13 times than the former rate (VND27,500/minute); message rate of only VND500/message, down nearly 10 times than the former rate (VND4,840/message). Especially, Viettel reduces the data rate down to 160 times to VND200,000/1Gb (compared to the former rate of VND32,200,000/1Gb).

For the newly applied policy, Viettel’s representative said now over the whole network of Viettel, there are more than 2 million subscribers roaming to Laos and Cambodia, but only 0.5% (nearly 10 thousand subscribers) use the roaming service. But the contacting is now considered as daily food and water; this means that everyone is in need. Viettel policy will give the significant support so that all clients can use the roaming service, which is considered expensive with the rate that not everyone can afford. Especially, the new charge also contributes to the revenue growth of domestic telecommunications because customers in Vietnam will not go to the two countries to buy SIM and can use their own SIM.

Aiming to create a “flat world” in the field of telecommunications, Viettel quits the roaming fee for the Indochina region. This movement is forecast to generate the important impetus to promote economic – commercial, cultural, tourism exchanges and tighten the neighborhood relationships in the region, affecting the economic blocks in the world to spread this policy.