November 24, 2024

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The KT Foreigner Center in Wongok-dong, Ansan, Gyeonggi Province caters to foreign customers, offering consultations in Chinese, Russian, Filipino, Khmer, Indonesian, Nepalese, Vietnamese and Burmese. (KT Corp.)

South Korea's leading telecom carrier, KT Corp., announced Sunday that the company will introduce new 5G mobile plans for foreign national residents starting Monday.

“KT decided to introduce new mobile plans as there are not enough plans specifically for foreigners despite the increasing number of foreign residents in the country,” KT said.

According to the Ministry of Justice, the number of long-term residents with nationalities other than Korean here grew to 1.9 million as of February this year, up from 1.7 million in February 2019.

KT has new plans at three different price points: 59,000 won ($42.80), 49,000 won and 39,000 won per month. The 59,000-won plan provides 5G access with a data cap of 5 gigabytes. When the 5 GB are exhausted, the plan gives limited access to mobile data at a controlled speed at a maximum of 5 megabytes per second. The 49,000-won and 39,000-won plans offer 5G access with a data cap of 3 GB and 1 GB, respectively. These plans also provide mobile data access at limited speeds: 3 MBps and 1 MBps.

Foreign nationals with residence cards can apply for the mobile plans until the end of October at KT offline stores or on the company’s official website, the company said. If they apply for the mobile plans by the end of October, they can also customize their data speed and data limit.

With a mobile contract -- usually lasting one or two years -- foreign national residents can also get a 25 percent discount on their monthly plan, KT added.

For those foreign national residents who use its new mobile plans, KT will provide an international calling plan without additional fees. With the international calling plan, dubbed “001 Free,” users can make international calls using their voice minutes for local calls.

KT currently offers the “001 Free” service for outbound calls to 38 countries, including China, Vietnam and the US.

For residents of foreign nationality who use its new mobile plans, KT will also give out two fee-free money transfer coupons every month, which can be used on Hanpass, a local remittance service.

“KT has launched new plans to maximize benefits for foreigners living here. The company will continue to bring changes in services provided to foreigners to improve convenience for them,” said Kim Young-geol, managing director of KT's Customer Business Division.

By Shim Woo-hyun (ws@heraldcorp.com)
The Korea Herald