Households spend $500 on communication in 2020

ANKARA

A family of four with a fixed-line broadband internet connection and each household member having a mobile phone on average spent 3,736 Turkish Liras (around $500) on communication in 2020.

Households’ mobile phone costs, including taxes, averaged some 43 liras per month, according a report by the Turkish Competitive Telco Operators’ Association (TELKODER).

3G subscribers spent nearly 49 liras per month, while fixed-line internet services cost households around 70 liras last year.

Consumers paid 18 percent value added tax and another 7.5 percent special communication tax, which is transferred to the state’s coffer, for communication services.

A family of four paid some 63 liras in taxes to the state each month, which summed up to a total of 759 liras last year.

Experts noted that the internet fees were hiked after the fair use policy was scrapped in 2019. The share of the internet in total communication expenditures and tax on the internet are expected to keep rising in the years to come, including 2021, they said.

“Households’ communication expenditures increased due to the foreign exchange rates and the price hikes in the industry last year. High taxes are a burden on consumers, particularly the special communication tax, which has been in effect for over the past 20 years,” said Halil Nadir Teberci, the head of TELKODER executive board, calling for the abolishment of this tax.

The number of broadband internet subscribers increased to 81 million in the third quarter of 2020 from only 6 million in 2008, said the latest report from the market regulator the Information and Communication Technologies Authority (BTK).

The report also showed that the number of mobile phone subscribers stood at 83 million, corresponding to a penetration rate of 99.6 percent.