Firm Offers Phone Service to Vietnam : Telecommunications: Long-distance company in Costa Mesa hopes to woo customers from major competitors with lower rates for direct-dial calls.
An upstart long-distance company hopes to compete with AT&T; and MCI in what is expected to be a lucrative market for phone calls to Vietnam.
Trans Pacific Telecommunications Management Inc. in Costa Mesa is offering rates below those of the major long-distance companies for calls to Vietnam, said co-owner Gary L. Goforth.
Through an agreement with U.S. and Canadian long-distance companies--Vortel Communications Inc. in San Francisco and Unitel Communications Inc. in Toronto--Trans-Pac is reselling long-distance service at discounts of 2% to 12%.
The new service comes just three weeks after AT&T; announced that it would soon offer direct-dial service to Vietnam. AT&T;, MCI Communications Corp. and Sprint Corp. currently offer phone service between the United States and Vietnam by routing calls through third countries, such as Australia, Canada and France. Direct-dial service is scheduled to be available by summer.
Unitel, an independent telecommunications network, sells its long-distance services to many countries. One of its customers is Vortel, which has contracted to resell some of its Unitel phone links to Vietnam to Trans-Pac.
Goforth said a major reason he can offer lower phone rates is that he has low overhead. His 20-person company, with a second office in Northern California, does not advertise.
“We do not need that many employees because the phone companies we do business with provide full staff and technical support for us,” Goforth said.
Trans-Pac co-owner and Chief Executive Son H. Luu, a Vietnamese immigrant, said that he and Goforth began looking into providing phone service to Vietnam a year ago, when they saw that the cost of placing a call to Vietnam through a third party was more than $8.50 per minute.
“It used to take two or three days to put a call through to Vietnam,” and the cost was very prohibitive, Luu said.
Co Long Pham, president of the Vietnamese Chamber of Commerce in Orange County, encouraged competition that could lead to cheaper rates.
“Free enterprise--that’s the way to make this service affordable,” he said. “This will make it easier and more affordable for many Vietnamese-Americans, particularly small businesses, to communicate with relatives or business associates in Vietnam.”
There are about 700,000 Vietnamese immigrants in the United States, most of whom arrived after Communists toppled the U.S.-backed South Vietnam government in April, 1975. Orange County has the nation’s highest concentration of Vietnamese immigrants--72,000--many located in Westminster and Garden Grove. The Bay Area also has a large Vietnamese population.
Steve Nguyen, president of Bolsa Travelmart in Westminster, said Trans-Pac’s new service will drastically cut his expenses. It costs $12 for his company to fax documents to Vietnam via Australia to get a tourist visa for a client, he said.
Only the three major telephone companies are authorized to provide direct telephone service to Vietnam, said Teresa Marrero, an attorney with the Federal Communications Commission, the federal agency in Washington that oversees long-distance companies. Neither AT&T;, MCI nor Sprint are “technically ready” to provide direct service, Marrero said, and all are routing calls through third countries.
Dialing for Dollars
Since the ban was lifted on telecommunications between the United States and Vietnam, several companies, including AT&T;, U.S. Sprint and MCI, have begun offering indirect phone service. But Trans Pacific Telecommunications Management Inc. of Costa Mesa is offering such service at rates lower than the competition’s.
Dialing
Dial these codes, then the phone number:
International access number: 011
Country code for Vietnam: 84
City code: Hanoi, 4; Ho Chi Minh City, 8
Rate Comparison
A 10-minute call from the continental United States to Vietnam on AT&T; or U.S. Sprint would cost between $18.44 and $22.44; the same 10-minute call on Trans-Pac would cost between $17.88 and $21.42.
Trans-Pac AT&T;, U.S. Sprint Initial Additional Initial Additional Initial Time of Day Minute Minutes Minute Minutes Minute Standard $2.79 $2.07 $2.91 $2.17 $2.90 (5 p.m.-2 a.m.) Discount 2.65 1.89 2.71 1.97 2.70 (2 a.m.-11 a.m.) Economy 2.49 1.71 2.51 1.77 2.50 (11 a.m.-5 p.m.)
MCI Additional Time of Day Minutes Standard $2.16 (5 p.m.-2 a.m.) Discount 1.96 (2 a.m.-11 a.m.) Economy 1.76 (11 a.m.-5 p.m.)
Sources: AT&T;, Trans Pacific Telecommunications Management Inc., MCI Communications Corp. , Sprint Corp.
