- Last Thursday morning, two weeks after the launch of Viva Bahrain, part of the Saudi Telecom Group, the queue of people applying for Viva’s prepaid or postpaid mobile services stretched more than 20 meters.
- The Viva Bahrain outlet at City Centre Mall wouldn’t even open for another half hour and it was a workday, but no matter — everyone was patiently waiting.
“This is a new company and their sign up offering is great,” said Anwar Abdullah, a Bahraini planning to pay a BD50 premium and get a Viva special category number of his choice. “There aren’t any good special numbers left with Batelco or Zain. Viva is my last chance.”
The people standing in line thought the wait would be worthwhile. Filipino Donny Reyes, actually lives in Saudi Arabia, but comes to Bahrain for his job. “I’m getting a VIVA line so that I can call all my friends in Saudi Arabia free from Bahrain. It’s cheaper than calling from my Saudi number.” He also was happy about the VIVA offer of up to 90 percent off international calls. Peak call rates to India are just 0.016 BD per minute, Pakistan is 0.029 BD and the Philippines is 0.056 BD.
The free calls to Saudi Arabia are to Saudi Telecom (STC) numbers only and all the promotional rates run out on June 4. Reyes also pointed out that he can roam with the VIVA service in Saudi Arabia and receive incoming calls for free. This free roaming arrangement is something that STC cannot offer its Saudi mobile subscribers due to a prohibition by the Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC), the Saudi telecom regulator.