Beginning 1 June 2005, Jamaica has begun assessing a tax (er, they call it a levy) on incoming minutes from overseas. To enforce the levy, Jamaica’s Ministry of Commerce, Science and Technology has blocked incoming calls being carried by AT&T, MCI, Sprint, and British Telecom.

The levy is US$0.03 per minute on calls terminating to land line numbers, and US$0.02 per minute on calls terminating to mobile numbers.

So why are calls blocked? Can’t the companies just pay the surcharge and call it a day? Well, that’s what they’re doing, now.

At the time of this writing, none of AT&T, MCI, Sprint, or British Telecom had made public statements on the matter, though all were reported to have been telling their customers the situation was temporary and expected to be resolved shortly.

Update 5 June: British Telecom has rejected Jamaica’s new tax on incoming international calls. According to a BT spokesman, “British Telecom is refusing to submit to this agreement seeing as it is extra-curricular to existing telecommunications agreements around the world.”

Always one to follow through, I placed a call to Jamaica just a few minutes ago, and was completely unable to get through. I tried using AT&T and received an American recording stating, “All circuits are busy now. Please try your call later. 0314.” Using MCI, I received an American recording stating “We’re sorry. Your call cannot be completed as dialed. Please check the number and dial again.” With Sprint, I was able to get through with no trouble. Obviously Sprint was the first to capitulate.

Calls from British Telecom seem to be getting through only rarely. I have a report from a source in the U.K. stating that you may hear “Your call cannot be completed at this time” for several attempts before finally getting through.

Update 5 June: I just made another round of test calls. AT&T and MCI still fail to put the call through, but I can reach Jamaica using Sprint. BT users should also be able to get through most of the time now, due to BT’s use of alternate call routing.

If you know more about how international calls are settled, please leave a comment. This is a very fuzzy area right now.

See also Jamaica phone blockage continues for some (6 June 2005).