Jio feature phone pre-booking suspended on high demand

MUMBAI: Reliance Industries (RIL) has suspended the pre-booking of its newly launched 4G VoLTE feature phone, JioPhone, till further notice after demand for the device far exceeded the target of making available 5 million phones a week.

“The customers can, however, register their details but we are not taking any pre-booking as of now,” said a person familiar with the matter. A message on Jio’s website – uploaded on Sunday – reads that the customers will be informed when the company resumes pre-booking.

RIL and Reliance Jio Infocomm didn’t respond to an email seeking comment. The Mukesh Ambani-led firm had also offered customers the option of booking the device through the offline channels through Jio retailers and multi-brand device retailers, including the Reliance Digital stores network. Sources say pre-booking has stopped across those offline outlets as well.

Jio Phone bookings with a Rs 500 advance had crossed the 3 million mark within a couple of hours of opening on August 24.

The device, which was unveiled at the Reliance Industries AGM, is effectively priced zero where customers will be required to pay a one-time deposit of Rs 1,500 for the handset, to be refunded after three years on return of the handset.

With voice free for life, a JioPhone user will get unlimited SMS services and half a GB of data a day for Rs 153 a month – about one-thirtieth the price of data in the market – and access to various Jio apps on music and movies among others, besides YouTube and Facebook.

There are also sachet options for recharges of smaller amount for a shorter time. Through the phone, Jio is targeting 500 million Indians who are still on feature, or basic, phones using primarily voice services and haven’t moved to a smartphone due to affordability or because they don’t really feel they need one.