Tata Teleservices on Thursday announced the launch of its prepaid service on fixed wireless phones with tariffs of 90 paise per pulse, and claimed the offer would translate into a 25 per cent saving on monthly usage.

"In addition, customers will get two free recharge cards worth Rs 540 each (with a talktime of Rs 450 on each card), thus giving a free talktime of Rs 900. They will also get a free caller ID and national SMS till May 2004," a Tata Teleservices statement said.

The 'PrePay FWP service' was launched in New Delhi and Hyderabad and would soon be available across select cities in Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.

"The pre-pay FWP has numerous intelligent features such as SMS, caller ID, missed call notification, 99 number phone book memory, hotline, etc," it said.

Tata Indicom PrePay fixed wireless phone service customer would be charged a one time non-refundable registration fee of Rs 2,000 and a deposit of Rs 2,000 towards the LG340 handset.

The Tata Indicom recharge cards would also be available in the denomination of Rs 324 and Rs 540, it added.

The pulse for all local calls to a fixed line and WLL (mobility) and to mobiles from Tata Indicom FWP phones would be 180 and 60 seconds, respectively.

This means a Tata Indicom PrePay customer making a local call to fixed or WLL (M) phone would pay 90 paise for 180 seconds and charge for calling a mobile phone would be 90 paise for 60 seconds, it added.