IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/orisre/v17y2006i3p247-253.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

On the Optimality of Fixed-up-to Tariff for Telecommunications Service

Author

Listed:
  • Yasushi Masuda

    (Faculty of Science and Technology, Keio University, Yokohama 223-8622, Japan)

  • Seungjin Whang

    (Graduate School of Business, Stanford University, 518 Memorial Way, Stanford, California 94305-5015)

Abstract

A tariff is the total charge payable by a customer for services provided. We study the design of tariffs for a telecommunications service provider. We develop an economic model that captures the negative externalities of the network and the diversity of customers. The tariff is designed so that it reflects the expected response of different customers and the system congestion it would induce. We study a simple tariff structure in wide use by mobile phone carriers---a menu of “fixed-up-to (FUT)” plans like “fixed access fee $35 up to 300 minutes, and $0.40 per minute beyond the limit.” We derive the optimal menu of FUT plans and show that such a simple FUT menu structure delivers as good performance to the monopolistic carrier as any nonlinear pricing schedule.

Suggested Citation

  • Yasushi Masuda & Seungjin Whang, 2006. "On the Optimality of Fixed-up-to Tariff for Telecommunications Service," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 17(3), pages 247-253, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:orisre:v:17:y:2006:i:3:p:247-253
    DOI: 10.1287/isre.1060.0097
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/isre.1060.0097
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1287/isre.1060.0097?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Haim Mendelson & Seungjin Whang, 1990. "Optimal Incentive-Compatible Priority Pricing for the M/M/1 Queue," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 38(5), pages 870-883, October.
    2. S. Rao & E. R. Petersen, 1998. "Optimal Pricing of Priority Services," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 46(1), pages 46-56, February.
    3. Mussa, Michael & Rosen, Sherwin, 1978. "Monopoly and product quality," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 301-317, August.
    4. Walter Y. Oi, 1971. "A Disneyland Dilemma: Two-Part Tariffs for a Mickey Mouse Monopoly," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 85(1), pages 77-96.
    5. Naor, P, 1969. "The Regulation of Queue Size by Levying Tolls," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 37(1), pages 15-24, January.
    6. K. Sridhar Moorthy, 1984. "Market Segmentation, Self-Selection, and Product Line Design," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 3(4), pages 288-307.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Hasan Cavusoglu & Huseyin Cavusoglu & Xianjun Geng, 2020. "Bloatware and Jailbreaking: Strategic Impacts of Consumer-Initiated Modification of Technology Products," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 31(1), pages 240-257, March.
    2. Atanu Lahiri & Rajiv M. Dewan & Marshall Freimer, 2013. "Pricing of Wireless Services: Service Pricing vs. Traffic Pricing," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 24(2), pages 418-435, June.
    3. Limbach, Felix, 2014. "Cooperative service provisioning with OTT players: An explorative analysis of telecommunication business models," 25th European Regional ITS Conference, Brussels 2014 101388, International Telecommunications Society (ITS).
    4. Ke-Wei Huang & Arun Sundararajan, 2011. "Pricing Digital Goods: Discontinuous Costs and Shared Infrastructure," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 22(4), pages 721-738, December.
    5. Robert F. Easley & Hong Guo & Jan Krämer, 2018. "Research Commentary—From Net Neutrality to Data Neutrality: A Techno-Economic Framework and Research Agenda," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 29(2), pages 253-272, June.
    6. Gérard P. Cachon & Pnina Feldman, 2011. "Pricing Services Subject to Congestion: Charge Per-Use Fees or Sell Subscriptions?," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 13(2), pages 244-260, June.
    7. Vidyanand Choudhary, 2010. "Use of Pricing Schemes for Differentiating Information Goods," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 21(1), pages 78-92, March.
    8. Philipp Afèche & Opher Baron & Joseph Milner & Ricky Roet-Green, 2019. "Pricing and Prioritizing Time-Sensitive Customers with Heterogeneous Demand Rates," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 67(4), pages 1184-1208, July.
    9. Pnina Feldman & Ella Segev, 2022. "The Important Role of Time Limits When Consumers Choose Their Time in Service," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(9), pages 6666-6686, September.
    10. Adib Bagh & Hemant K. Bhargava, 2013. "How to Price Discriminate When Tariff Size Matters," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 32(1), pages 111-126, August.
    11. Chen, Yi-Ting & Sun, Edward W. & Lin, Yi-Bing, 2020. "Merging anomalous data usage in wireless mobile telecommunications: Business analytics with a strategy-focused data-driven approach for sustainability," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 281(3), pages 687-705.
    12. Ying-Ju Chen & Ke-Wei Huang, 2016. "Pricing Data Services: Pricing by Minutes, by Gigs, or by Megabytes per Second?," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 27(3), pages 596-617.
    13. Basu, Sumanta & Chakraborty, Soumyakanti & Sharma, Megha, 2015. "Pricing cloud services—the impact of broadband quality," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 96-114.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Philipp Afèche, 2013. "Incentive-Compatible Revenue Management in Queueing Systems: Optimal Strategic Delay," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 15(3), pages 423-443, July.
    2. Philipp Afèche & J. Michael Pavlin, 2016. "Optimal Price/Lead-Time Menus for Queues with Customer Choice: Segmentation, Pooling, and Strategic Delay," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(8), pages 2412-2436, August.
    3. S. Rao & E. R. Petersen, 1998. "Optimal Pricing of Priority Services," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 46(1), pages 46-56, February.
    4. Vibhanshu Abhishek & Mustafa Dogan & Alexandre Jacquillat, 2021. "Strategic Timing and Dynamic Pricing for Online Resource Allocation," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 67(8), pages 4880-4907, August.
    5. Philipp Afèche & Opher Baron & Joseph Milner & Ricky Roet-Green, 2019. "Pricing and Prioritizing Time-Sensitive Customers with Heterogeneous Demand Rates," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 67(4), pages 1184-1208, July.
    6. De Munck, Thomas & Chevalier, Philippe & Tancrez, Jean-Sébastien, 2023. "Managing priorities on on-demand service platforms with waiting time differentiation," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 266(C).
    7. Atabek Atayev, 2021. "Nonlinear Prices, Homogeneous Goods, Search," Papers 2109.15198, arXiv.org.
    8. Zhang, Yibin & Hafezi, Maryam & Zhao, Xuan & Shi, Victor, 2017. "Reprint of “The impact of development cost on product line design and its environmental performance”," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 194(C), pages 126-134.
    9. Kopalle, Praveen K. & Pauwels, Koen & Akella, Laxminarayana Yashaswy & Gangwar, Manish, 2023. "Dynamic pricing: Definition, implications for managers, and future research directions," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 99(4), pages 580-593.
    10. Qiuping Yu & Gad Allon & Achal Bassamboo & Seyed Iravani, 2018. "Managing Customer Expectations and Priorities in Service Systems," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(8), pages 3942-3970, August.
    11. Manlu Chen & Ming Hu & Jianfu Wang, 2022. "Food Delivery Service and Restaurant: Friend or Foe?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 68(9), pages 6539-6551, September.
    12. Zhao, Chen & Wang, Zhongbin, 2023. "The impact of line-sitting on a two-server queueing system," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 308(2), pages 782-800.
    13. Preyas S. Desai, 2001. "Quality Segmentation in Spatial Markets: When Does Cannibalization Affect Product Line Design?," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 20(3), pages 265-283, August.
    14. Hassin, Refael & Haviv, Moshe & Oz, Binyamin, 2023. "Strategic behavior in queues with arrival rate uncertainty," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 309(1), pages 217-224.
    15. Yan, Xiaoming & Zhao, Wenhan & Yu, Yugang, 2022. "Optimal product line design with reference price effects," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 302(3), pages 1045-1062.
    16. Fangruo Chen, 2001. "Market Segmentation, Advanced Demand Information, and Supply Chain Performance," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 3(1), pages 53-67, February.
    17. Amit Basu & Sreekumar Bhaskaran, 2018. "An Economic Analysis of Customer Co-design," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 29(4), pages 787-804, December.
    18. Kinshuk Jerath & Sang-Hyun Kim & Robert Swinney, 2017. "Product Quality in a Distribution Channel with Inventory Risk," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 36(5), pages 747-761, September.
    19. van Ackere, Ann, 1995. "Capacity management: Pricing strategy, performance and the role of information," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 89-100, June.
    20. Zhou, Pin & Xu, He & Chen, Jiguang, 2020. "Value of down-conversion policy in a vertical differentiated co-production system," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 228(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:inm:orisre:v:17:y:2006:i:3:p:247-253. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Asher (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.