ACCAN has made a submission to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) Mobile Terminating Access Service (MTAS) declaration inquiry.

The review asked whether access to mobile networks should be 'declared' for the purpose of connecting calls.

'Declaring' a service allows a mobile call to be connected between two different providers at a fixed per-minute rate and on certain terms. For example, if your phone provider is Telstra it allows you to call a friend on Optus.

In this example MTAS makes sure that Telstra can connect a call on the Optus network at a rate which represents the cost of the call. Without declaration Optus would be free to charge well above cost to access its network and this high cost would probably be passed on to consumers.

ACCAN made the following key points:

•  That declaration of MTAS has led to significant benefits for consumers through lower prices for SMS and mobile voice services;
  
  

• That declaration of MTAS has led to improvements in the level of retail mobile competition;
  
  
• That declaration of MTAS should continue in order to ensure that consumers can continue to benefit from competitively priced services that reflect the underlying cost of providing them.

Download:  ACCAN submission to MTAS inquiry93.49 KB
Download:  ACCAN submission to MTAS inquiry494.28 KB