Indiantelevision.com Team

(7 February 2008 3:00 pm)

NEW DELHI: The 25 per cent ad surcharge issue, pressed by the Indian Broadcasting Foundation (IBF) on advertising agencies, remains in a limbo.

The recent meeting between IBF and AAAI (Advertising Agencies Association of India) in Mumbai did not discuss the issue at all, sources tell Indiantelevision.com.

"The focus of the meeting was on the lines of action to be taken against agencies that have not paid their dues to the channels. The 25 per cent surcharge issue never came up," a senior executive of a broadcasting company said.

The AAAI, it seems, has in principle agreed upon a hike without setting a roadmap for it. Some executives who attended the meeting said that the issue seems to have fallen through.

However, the CEO of a channel who has been wrangling with the issue told indiantelevision.com that there was no question of dropping the issue. "AAAI has agreed that there should be a rate hike as programming costs have gone up. The reach of satellite TV channels has also expanded. But there has been no definitive agreement on how much the hike should be," he said.

IBF had initially issued an advisory to its members to raise the surcharge, but there was a heavy protest from the advertising body. "After that, there has been no movement on the issue," sources said.