Press Releases

Budapest, April 22, 2003

The number of "Felező" subscribers grew by another 50 000 over two weeks, which means that more than 150 thousand people are now halving their monthly fee. The minute fees in Matáv's "Felező" tariff package decreased considerably as of March 1, 2003, and over 150 000 customers are taking advantage of the savings opportunity offered by this favorable change.

The majority of customers polled by Matáv indicated that they did not like paying a monthly fee. Due to this, Matáv decided that, in addition to offering service packages adjusted to the telephone usage habits of its customers, it would also introduce a tariff package called "Felező", which provides users with call credit of up to half their monthly fee. In just two and a half months, over 150,000 customers have selected this tariff package. With this, it became clear that for most customers the principal factor inhibiting increased fixed telephone usage was the monthly fee. Now, with the "Felező" package Matáv managed has not only managed to overcome that problem, but has even succeeded in attracting many new subscribers.

The construction and success of the "Felező" has proven that the subscribers are all too willing to opt for the fixed phone – whose minute fees are usually less than those of the mobile phones – provided that the subscription fees are further decreased and that they get discounts tailored to their telephone usage habits.

The "Felező" tariff package grants its users up to 2 hours free telephone usage monthly. Subscribers receive call credit worth 1605 HUF gross (half of the 3210 HUF monthly gross subscription fee) and in addition, no connection fees are charged. Starting in March, "Felező" customers may call local and domestic long-distance numbers outside the peak hours for 12 HUF gross per minute instead of 25 HUF gross per minute, while in the peak period there is 20% discount on the minute fee which will thus be reduced to 20 HUF gross.

Matáv recommends this tariff package mainly for those users who receive medium-size telephone bills each month (i.e. between 4000 and 7000 HUF). The tariff package is an especially good choice for those users who live in the country, since they may phone at any time of the day with discount long-distance rates, and without a connection charge.