German mobile operator Deutsche Telekom announced that it is lifting its ban on mobile VoIP. Instead, the parent company of T-Mobile (News - Alert) says it will grant VoIP for cellphones as long as customers pay a $14 a month fee.

 

The move will let T-Mobile customers in Germany use VoIP services such as Skype, an Internet phone service owned by eBay Inc. that routes calls through the Internet. Currently, using Skype or other VoIP applications on smartphones such as Apple's (News - Alert) iPhone, the G1 Google phone, or with handsets with Microsoft Corp.'s (MSFT) Windows Mobile software is a breach of contract for T-Mobile users in Germany, the company said.

 

The VoIP service will be available this summer, the company said.

 

Georg Pölzl, managing director of T-Mobile Deutschland, explained the company is charging an extra fee to use of VoIP apps because they require "additional investment in the network."

 

"It would not be fair to customers who don't use VoIP if these additional costs were to be shared across all customers,” Pölzl said in a statement. “For this reason, we are making it possible to use Internet telephony via optional rates, while keeping it otherwise barred."

 

The company in April blocked users from accessing VoIP applications designed specifically for the iPhone. That month, a Skype (News - Alert) application was made available in Apple's application store and was downloaded more than 600,000 times by iPhone users globally within the first 24 hours following its launch, the Wall Street Journal reported.

 

According to another Wall Street Journal report, T-Mobile's rules on using applications like Skype on 3G phones are stricter compared to those of its top competitors. Because using VoIP or IM applications on the network is a breach of contract, T-Mobile reserves the right to block the application, the company said.

 

As Gary Kim, a TMC contributing writer predicts, some customers may object to the fee for service, arguing that they've already paid for data access. VoIP is something people should be able to do with the access they already paid for, he wrote.

 

T-Mobile is Germany's largest network provider with 39 million customers. Recently, the network collapsed creating a widespread outage. As TMC reported, the cause was the failure of the Home Location Register, the database that correlates individual subscriber information modules and phone numbers, so calls can be routed to the right radio sites.

 

T-Mobile isn’t the only provider looking to please customers. Vodafone (News - Alert) PLC plans to a similar option for its German customers soon, The Wall Street Journal said. However, no decision has been made on the surcharge.

 

In other news, T-Mobile plans to launch Nokia’s (News - Alert) flagship smartphone the N97 sometime this summer. Under a deal with Nokia, the Skype app will be preload on the new devices. But the app will not appear on the T-Mobile Germany versions, reports mocoNews.net.