Airtel mobile customers can now sms bill payment

Bangalore, Sep 6 (UNI) Country's leading GSM mobile operator Airtel today announced the national rollout of its latest value added service of enabling post paid customers pay their bills through sms under a new facility called the 'mChek'.

Having a share of 31.58 per cent of the GSM subscribers with the physical numbers crossing 44 million, Airtel's new and unique service was claimed to be the first of its kind in the world.

Airtel Karnataka Circle CEO V Venkatesh told newsmen here that the Mobile operator also annoiunced another new service one2one under which a customer could information on billing, payments, billing plans, new services and complaint management.

Both the services would be available free of cost. Under mChek a post paid subscriber can pay his mobile phone bill using his visa credit card by sending a simple sms and get an acknowledgment for the payment. mCheck comes with in built checks and validations to ensure completely secure and risk free transaction he added.

Subscribers can sign up for mChek payment mode either through mobile phone or through internet.

Mr Venkatesh said Karnataka circle alone had a subscriber base of 5.1 million which was the highest for any operator in any state.

Airtel had a 40 per cent share of the Circle's total GSM subscriber base and had set up a record 4,000 base station towers across the state. It was the first circle operator across any telecom service provider in India to set up such a vast number of network sites.

Airtel AP circle had a subscriber base of 4.3 million, while Delhi had 3.4 million.

He said the tech savy city saw 30 per cent of Airtel subscribers paying bills through credit cards and nearly 20 per cent of the subscribers use internet for payment.

UNI