further sigh of relief today as a new rate cut was announced last night.

And TeleBermuda General Manager James Fitzgerald hinted that more changes are afoot -- promising "many new initiatives and undertakings that we will be sharing in the next 30 to 90 days''.

For residential customers, the new round of cuts is operated by TeleBermuda as the "Simply the Best'' programme with evening and weekend rates being cut to 29 cents per minute for residential callers to the US, Canada, the UK and Ireland.

Business callers will enjoy an automatic reduction in the base rates for calling to the same countries of between 33 cents per minute to 71 cents per minute, once volume discounts and time of day savings are taken into account.

In three years, TeleBermuda has reduced overseas calling costs eight times or by up to 70 percent of former rates.

On weekends residential callers can now benefit with an expansion of the discounted calling period to between 6 p.m. on Friday to 8 a.m. on Monday.

During week nights, residential callers can now make their calls at the discounted rates between 6 p.m. and 8 a.m.

In addition, calling rates to other countries around the world are also being reduced with weekend calls jumping down to as low as 59 cents per minute and daytime rates at as little as 79 cents per minute.

Mr. Fitzgerald said: "TeleBermuda is continuing with its plan to reduce the cost of overseas calling for our commercial and residential customers while at the same time introducing new services and enhancements to our product offering.

"The cost of overseas calling in Bermuda has been reduced by as much as 70 percent since TeleBermuda initially entered the market,'' he continued. "The cost of data and Internet services has also been reduced by as much as 60 percent.

"At TeleBermuda we plan to continue in our leadership position of providing high quality telecommunication services at the most cost-effective rates for our customers.'' Mr. Fitzgerald concluded: "TeleBermuda firmly believes that competition brings out the best in us all. For our customers this means that we will continue to deliver in providing improved technologies, new services, and the very best in cost savings and customer service.