Yellowknife (Aug 25/03) - NorthwesTel will be lowering its long-distance calling plans for businesses by close to 10 per cent effective Sept. 1.

Allen Stanzel, general manager for Mack Travel, says the reduction in fees will be a good thing for his business.

"I think a lot of times businesses in the North have overhead costs which are higher than elsewhere. Any reduction of those costs is a good thing," said Stanzel.

But Evelyn Nind with Marlin Yellowknife Travel didn't think the reduction would save her business much money.

"We avoid long distance like the plague," said Nind.

"We do everything by e-mail or fax," she said, explaining faxes provide her with a paper trail to ensure customers' reservations.

Anne Kennedy, director of public affairs with NorthwesTel, provided the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) with much of the credit for business phoning reductions.

The CRTC has provided NorthwesTel with $71 million in supplementary funding over the past four years, said Kennedy.

The supplementary funding has been used to improve NorthwesTel's long-distance network and lower rates.

"Before we had supplementary funding our rates were quite high," said Kennedy.

"Our customers understandably were not happy and we started losing revenue. Through prepaid calling cards, and through the Friends and Family Program we had many reversal calls initiating down South, so we saw huge revenue erosion because of that.

"We went to the CRTC in 1999 and said we have to be competitive, and started proceeding to lower long-distance rates," said Kennedy.

The reduction has also come about as a result of an increase in one-time installation rates, which has taken the corporation from the lowest level for installation fees throughout the country to two-thirds up the scale.

Other rate increases went up in 2001.

"Our monthly rates were quite low and they (CRTC) wanted us to bring those up but there's no further increases planned," said Kennedy.

The corporation has also seen increased revenue from the Internet and high speed digital fibre optics.

NorthwesTel works on a regulated rate of return, whereas Southern telecommunications compete for business.

Overall, 570 people work with NorthwesTel throughout the NWT, Yukon and northern British Columbia.