MEPs flatten roaming costs The EU's Industry Committee has voted to agree the Commission's proposed cap on calls home of €.40 a minute, and €.11 for text messages, but has undercut the Commission in asking for per-second billing and data rates of €.50/MB wholesale. The Industry Committee is made up of MEPs, and it is the Committee that takes …
Unlikely if I'm reading the article correctly then the charges referred to are the termination charges that the networks bill each for. So while this means the networks wont be ripping each other off to there previous levels theres no absolute guaruntee that these reductions will be passed on to the customers.
It's a step in the right direction but more needs to be done in making sure that any reductions are passed on to the users.
Leave yer fucking mobile at home and buy a new one where you're going!
And what's all that cock about the whole of Europe being our Homeland now? My arse. Same charges everywhere. I euro an hour for data, and a euro for eight working hours, and free outside those hours at weekends. Lets have some bloody communications infrastructure!
(Paris cos she's got a nice infrastructure from what "they" tell me...)
I'd have thought it was in my phone operator's interest to set their roaming charges low enough that i actually feel tempted to use the thing when roaming. If they drive me to buy a foreign SIM, they loose.
On data charges: the intention of the GPS+Maps application in my phone is that I can go anywhere, and find a map of where I am. At £3 per MB, when I was lost in Athens, it was cheaper to get in a taxi than to bother firing up the maps app. The operator looses again. At £0.50 per MB I might have been interested.
The only reasonable conclusion seems to be that they want to make their money by tricking people into spending excessively (and accidentally) on calls and data, only realizing the true cost when they get home. I don't call that a reputable business model. If that is the way it is, then I hope the EU regulates them like mad; they've got it coming.
Eurocrats doing some good (although I'm sure the dailyfailers will find some way to whine about this anyway).
To xjy: Last year I passed through six European countries in a week, and wanted to work remotely in each. Do you really expect I'd buy six mobile contracts for a week's worth of work? And anyway, do you think you can wander into a shop and say 'Yes, I'd like to sign up for a contract, but I don't live in this country.'?
As roaming data charges are so expensive, I had to find WiFi subscription services, most inconvenient for roaming; and there's not many services that span several countries.
it is better to change your sim and go pay as you go in the country you are in provided it is for a sufficiently long period of time.
But! For the benefit of MEPs:
UKPSPL = UK Public Service Provider Licence
.
.
.
EUPSPL = European Union Public Service Provider Licence (this can also cater for an amalgam, cabal or cohort of providers)
With all this fuss about EU one would think it was a huge territory but! it ain't.
EU in geographic terms is quite small really and the swifter MEPs act up the better it could be for all (have you seen the geographic footprint and population densities of India, China, ... ?)
It's not your home operator charging the money, it's the operator who's network you've roamed onto. Because you aren't one of their own customers, they are happy to charge exorbitant fees which your home operator has no choice but to pay (and pass on) - in general, the foreign operator doesn't care if you think they are a bunch of grabbing b***ards, you aren't their customers and most likely you are only roaming for a short time and it won't be worth your while finding out if another operator is cheaper to roam onto (they won't be, the other networks are also on the same grabbing job).
These caps are to stop this "lets rip off the tourists and business people because they aren't our customers" malarky. Competitive pressures should mean that your home network won't add too much on - you are their customer and they want to keep you.
Yeh, it sounds the same business model used by financiers is the +anking sector (transfer 2mill fro one account to another and earn 20k for shuffling the dosh about?)
And is probably the same business model used by NHS in the 1980's (bump up patient throughput figures by transferring patients to 3 wards therefore 20 'solid' patients become 60 'virtual' patients.
Perhaps it is time sector good practice organisations espoused responsibility matters responsibly?
Why kill the goose that lays the golden egg?
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
