Venezuela increases long distance rates

Venezuela's telecoms regulator Conatel has announced an increase in the charges to operators for incoming long distance calls that reaches as high as 614%.

Long distance incoming calls to fixed line numbers will now cost 55.56 bolívares per minute and 116.57 bolivars per minute for calls to mobile phones.

Conatel's director William Castillo was reported as saying to local daily El Estímulo that the increase in rates will not affect the end user but are designed to eliminate illegal 'grey' traffic which bypasses the networks of operators with licenses and terminate calls on the networks of unlicensed operators.

In July, the Associated Press reported that Venezuelans are struggling to call abroad as telephone carriers fall behind on payments to international partners amid a currency crisis.

Movistar ended long distance service from Venezuela to all but 10 countries in May. Digitel, the other major private operator, cut service to more than 100 countries and told congress it was in tens of millions of dollars debt to foreign providers.

Foreign companies operating in Venezuela have struggled to take profits out of the country due to currency controls.

In October this year, IP enterprise communications provider Level 3 said it would decouple reporting of its Venezuela operations from those of the rest of Latin America effective September 1 due to the devaluation of the bolívar.