Press Release issued by the Commerce,
Industry and Technology Bureau (CITB) on 4 March 2005
Government to Reduce Telecom
Licence Fee
The Government will reduce the annual fee for mobile stations under
Public Radiocommunications Service (PRS) Licences, Mobile
Carrier Licences, and Public Non-exclusive Telecommunications
Service (PNETS) Licences from HK$20 to HK$18 per mobile
station, with effect from May 1, 2005.
A spokesman for the Commerce, Industry and Technology
Bureau said that the cost of administering these licences
has declined as a result of the increase in the number
of mobile stations (calculated by reference to the number
of mobile phone subscribers, including activated prepaid
SIM cards), from 6.5 million in December 2003 to 7.1
million in October 2004.
All the 2G and 3G mobile services operators, together
with the trunked radio operators, radiolocation service
operators, mobile data service operators, paging companies,
and mobile virtual network operators will benefit from
the fee reduction.
As required by the Telecommunications Ordinance, the
Government launched a public consultation exercise on
reduction of licence fee for Mobile Carrier Licences
on January 7, 2005. The consultation ended on 28 January
2005 and a total of 11 submissions were received. The
submissions are generally supportive of the Government's
proposed licence fee reduction.
To reduce the annual licence fee for mobile stations
under PRS Licences and Mobile Carrier Licences, the
Telecommunications (Amendment) Regulation 2005 and the
Telecommunications (Carrier Licences) (Amendment) Regulation
2005 were gazetted today (March 4).
The two amendment regulations will be tabled at the
Legislative Council on March 9, 2005. Subject to the
approval of the Legislative Council through the negative
vetting procedure, the new fees will take effect on
May 1, 2005.
For mobile stations under PNETS Licences, the Telecommunications
Authority will amend the licence fee payable on May
1, 2005 to implement the same reduction for these licences.
Ends/Friday, March 4, 2005
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