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Mobile communication operators are demanding right to provide mobile payments. "To actively develop useful and convenient service of mobile payments in Ukraine, the state should introduce amendments into the legislation that regulates provision of telecommunication and financial services," press service of the Kyivstar telecommunication operator told the Ukrainian News agency. Kyivstar said that current legislation allows mobile communication subscribers to pay only for telecommunication services using their mobile phones, but payments for services rendered by other organizations refer to financial services and require respective licensing. Press service of the MTS Ukraine mobile communication operator also said that operators cannot independently hold mobile payments as they do not have legal right to that. In its turn, press service of the Astelit mobile communication operator (the life:) brand) told the Ukrainian News agency that the company is analyzing situation in that sector and searching opportunity to provide the service in frames of current legislation.

The MTS Ukraine mobile communication operator on March 2 renewed the MTS Office line of tariff plans for corporate subscribers. The renewed line comprises tariffs MTS Office 10, MTS Office 30, MTS Office 50 and MTS Office 90. In these tariffs the number of in-package minutes of calls to subscribers of MTS and other operators from 150 — 600 minutes to 250 — 1,000 minutes depending on the tariff. Also, in all tariffs but MTS Office 10 prices of calls to other operators' subscribers have been cut by 10 kopecks a minute to 50 kopecks a minute. In the MTS Office 10 tariff calls within the MTS network over the package minutes cost 10 kopecks a minute, while in other renewed tariffs these remain at the previous level, 20 kopecks a minute. Before, the MTS Office line included tariffs MTS Office 20, MTS Office 40 and MTS Office 80. Numbers in the names of the old and renewed tariffs mean the amount of monthly subscriber fees in hryvnias. One-time advance payment in the renewed tariffs makes UAH 29, UAH 49, UAH 99 and UAH 199 respectively. Apart from this, MTS Office 50 and MTS Office 90 offer free-of-charge internet traffic of 200 Mb and 400 Mb a month within the Mobile GPRS Internet service. The MTS Office line has per-second billing. As Ukrainian News earlier reported, MTS introduced the MTS Office line of tariff plans for corporate subscribers on October 1, 2010.

In January, the number of subscribers of Ukrainian mobile-telephone operators fell by 0.6% or 0.32 million to 53.69 million. Ukrainian News has learned this from results of a research conducted by iKS-Consulting, a wording of which was made available to the agency. In particular, the combined number of subscribers to the services of Kyivstar and Beeline (Ukrainian Radiosystems and Golden Telecom companies) made up 24.33 million, the number of subscribers to MTS' services made up 18.21 million, and to the services of Astelit company (life:) brand) 9.02 million. The rest of subscribers belong to the biggest telecommunications company Ukrtelecom and three CDMA operators. As Ukrainian News earlier reported, in December 2010, the number of subscribers of Ukrainian mobile-telephone operators fell by 0.5% to 54.01 million.

The MTS Ukraine mobile communication operator introduced My New Number service from February 1. The service allows the clients to inform relatives or friends about change of telephone number. The service is introduced for new MTS subscribers who have changed their number or the operator. All subscribers calling to someone's previous number will obtain information about new number of the subscriber they call to. The call will not cost anything and the called subscriber will obtain an SMS containing the number of the person that addressed. To use the service, a client should activate it calling to 765 and choosing options of the service and mentioning previous number. The service is provided in two modes: "Show My New Number" and "Conceal My New Number." As Ukrainian News earlier reported, in December, the number of subscribers to the mobile communications services of MTS Ukraine company grew by 0.1% or 0.01 million to 18.24 million people. The number of subscribers increased by 3.9% or 0.68 million compared to December 2009. In November, the number of subscribers to the mobile communications services of MTS Ukraine company remained at 18.23 million people. MTS finished 2009 with a net profit of UAH 640.3 million. In 2009, the operator decreased its net revenues by 4.9% or UAH 421.5 million, comparing with 2008, to UAH 8,172.7 million.

The Kyivstar telecommunications operator sees no legal grounds to provide free services allowing subscribers to retain their telephone numbers when changing from one mobile communications operator to another. The press service of Kyivstar announced this to Ukrainian News. According to a commentary by Kyivstar's department of regulatory and legal framework, number portability service (transfer of telephone numbers from one network to another) is a telecommunications service and, according to the law "On Telecommunications," operators can set their own tariffs for such services. "Thus, there is no basis for establishment of MNP (Mobile Number Portability) as a free service under the relevant legal realities without making any changes to the law 'On Telecommunications,'" the company said in the statement. The press service of the MTS Ukraine mobile operator told Ukrainian News that the operator considers it tempting to provide this service free of charge but provision of any telecommunications services (including this service) involves expenditures that need to be evaluated and establishment of sources of funds for financing them. The Astelit mobile operator (the life:) brand name) told Ukrainian News that the approach of the National Communications Regulation Commission to introduction of number portability services is fully consistent with Astelit's customer-oriented logic. As Ukrainian News earlier reported, the National Communications Regulation Commission preliminarily approved on December 23 a draft provision on provision of subscriber number portability services and use of personal numbers, which proposes providing such services free to subscribers.