Vodafone is rumoured to be considering following Optus and terminating its contract with Bill Express for the latter to resell air time on prepaid mobile phones through the latter's newsagency network. The contract for newsagents to resell air time on Optus via Bill Express is thought to have expired at the end of last week. Newsagency sources say that Bill Express owes around $1 million to Optus.Optus is directing disgruntled newsagents to ePay as an alternative intermediary to maintain sale of their phone cards. ePay is a subsidiary of ePay UK which is part of US-based Euronet Worldwide.The Bill Express business model is under strain more broadly, amid talk that around one thousand newsagents have notified an intention to terminate their agreements with Bill Express. "Many agencies see this as the last straw in their relationship with Bill Express," said prominent Victorian newsagent Mark Fletcher."We've all had a challenging relationship with Bill Express for a number of years."We signed onto a $495 a month lease and over time that got more expensive. With Optus gone and noise around that Vodafone will leave, the value of that monthly lease has gone down substantially."Traffic from mobile phone top ups is substantially more valuable to newsagents than bill payments, said Mark Fletcher, the owner of two of Bill Express' top 100 agents."Optus and Vodafone together would be 70 per cent of that," said Fletcher."My agencies would take around 300 bills per month, and those people are less likely than the mobile phone customers to buy something else."But this has hurt agents, no doubt. We are about providing service to our community and customers, and we are increasingly competing with Australia Post. Not having bills will hurt us."Bill Express declined to comment on either the Optus or Vodafone issues.Shares in Bill Express were trading at four cents ahead of the second of two trading halts last week. The share price was 17 cents early in 2008 and was 24 cents a year ago.