According to Order No. 357-c/2 of the RF Federal Rates Service of 23.11.2007 (registered by the Ministry of Justice under No. 10734 on 14.12.2007), starting from 1st February 2008, some rates for local telephone communication of OJSC North-West Telecom will be changed .

For individual subscribers the limit (maximum) rate of the "Limitless" rate plan (the rate with the subscriber fee system) is reduced: from 400 to 340 roubles for the Northern branches ( Arkhangelsk , Karelia, Komi, Murmansk ), from 350 to 305 roubles for the Central branches ( Vologda , Kaliningrad , Novgorod, Pskov and Leningrad Oblast) and from 370 to 330 roubles for subscriber s of the St. Petersburg branch).

The actual amount of the "Limitless" rate plan will remain after 1st February 330 roubles for the Northern branches and 295 roubles for the St. Petersburg and Central branches.

Starting from 1st February 2008, the amount of the applicable "limitless" rates for the subscribers connected using the paired method**is reduced: by 30 roubles - for the Northern branches, by 22.5 roubles - for the Central branches, and by 20 roubles - for the St. Petersburg branch.

From 1st February 2008, the per-minute price of a local telephone connection under the "Time-based" rate is increased from 25 to 26 kopecks for all subscribers of the St. Petersburg and Central branches OJSC N.W. Telecom. For subscribers of the Northern branches (individuals) the cost of 1 minute of a local telephone connection in case of exceeding the base connection s volume under the "Combined-100" rate plan is increased from 35 to 36 kopecks.

For individual subscribers of the St. Petersburg branch of OJSC N.W.Telecom , the base connection s volume of the "Combined-400" rate plan is increased from 400 to 450 minutes. This means that another 50 minutes are added to the base connection s volume with the retained amount of the monthly payment (225 roubles). Respectively, the rate plan will be called "Combined-450".

For corporate subscribers of OJSC N.W.Telecom the base volume of local telephone connection s will be reduced starting from 1st February 2008 in combined rate plans: "Combined-400" (in the Central branches), "Combined-550" (in the Northern branches) and "Combined-600" (in the St. Petersburg branch). Thus, the above rate plans will be called (and include the respective number of minutes) as follows: "Combined-333" in the Central branches, "Combined-350" in the Northern branches, "Combined-275" in the Karelian branch and "Combined-450" in the St. Petersburg branch***.

"For more than a year more than 90% of the subscribers of our Company have been using the new rates for local communication and may choose between payment systems: time-based, subscriber or combined billing. Unlike many other operators, OJSC N.W. Telecom has provided this possibility both to individual subscribers and to corporate subscribers. The procedure of rates calculation adopted by the Federal Rates Service has not only made it possible to realize the social component of the Federal Law "On Communication" by providing the possibility of choosing the most advantageous and affordable rate to subscriber s, it has also allowed fixed-line communication operators to make up a set of various competitive rate plans and to apply a number of measures for their marketing promotion. And, of course, OJSC N.W. Telecom is using this opportunity, having three mandatory rate plans for individuals and organizations, two additional plans for individuals and one for enterprise s, as well as several package offers of services that make it possible for a subscriber who has applied for a package to have a serious saving",Deputy General Manager and Commercial Manager of OJSC N.W. Telecom Oleg Popov noted.

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At the moment the following packages of communication services are offered by OJSC N.W. Telecom to subscribers:

- "House-warming" – simultaneous connection to the local telephone communication network and provision of high-speed Avangard access to the Internet with the possibility of getting a discount up to 40% of the total price of connecting the two services;

- "Telephone + High-speed Internet " - makes it possible to save from 50 to 260 roubles monthly for those of OJSC N.W. Telecom's subscribers who have chosen the "Limitless" rate plan for the payment for local communication services and are using the Avangard service;

- the package including the services of intraareal telephone communication (telephone connections inside the region) and the services of dial-up access to the Internet – the rates for the services provided within these packages has been reduced as compared to the applicable rates by 10-20%.  

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*"Limitless" rates that have been applied starting from 01.02.2007 were established by a respective decision of OJSC N.W.Telecom almost 20% lower than their approved limit value.

**With the paired method of equipment connection , a reduction factor of 0.5 is applied to the respective limit rates with the individual method of connection s.

***With the change of the base connection volume, the monthly payment for corporate subscribers will remain at the previous level (the Central branches and the St. Petersburg branch) or will be reduced (the Norhtern branches).