SKorea unveils new guidelines on mobile fees

When the guidelines take effect in November, fees for each household are likely to be cut by up to eight percent, the Korea Communications Commission (KCC) said.

Under the new rules, mobile operators will stop billing for ten-second chunks of time, a controversial system under which any extra second is rounded off to 10 seconds, and start charging per second.

KCC also told the country's mobile carriers to lower rates for long-term users and to cut fees for data services for Internet users.

Telecom giants SK Telecom, KT and LG Telecom have agreed to bring down charges for long-term customers and promote the use of "pay-as-you-go" mobile services, Yonhap news agency said.

The new pricing guidelines came after the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development released a report saying that many South Korean mobile phone users pay more than customers in other member nations.

(c) 2009 AFP