Live data from Hacker News

Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

techcrunch.com

41–50 of 359 posts

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#41

Yeah, the telcos have already found a way out. They simply remove EU roaming from their standard subscriptions and it now becomes an add-on. So if you want to use your phone in a different country during the holidays, you'll need an EU roaming subscription. The politicians once again failed to be sufficient precise in formulating a law that would produce the decided result. They should have added a clause that state…

Can you name one European operator that does that?

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#42
post #29

Yeah, the telcos have already found a way out. They simply remove EU roaming from their standard subscriptions and it now becomes an add-on. So if you want to use your phone in a different country during the holidays, you'll need an EU roaming subscription. The politicians once again failed to be sufficient precise in formulating a law that would produce the decided result. They should have added a clause that state…

Phew. That's good to know. As someone who has absolutely no desire to ever need "roaming", it's good to know it won't be forced on people.

What? The benefits of having roaming policies for a person that doesn't travel, is completely the same as if there are no policies. There is nothing to be forced upon you.

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#43
post #9
post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Roaming costs are price gouging, the associated costs of providing roaming are nowhere near.

There is still a cost. And that cost is going to be passed on to everyone whether you use it or not.

I'm not sure that there is a cost in aggregate – what is the money being spent on?

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Telecoms in at least some countries are already having to back down on that due to regulator pressure.

Everything fine in Greece too. In fact, I've been using this for free for a year+ because my telco decided to include it in my (high-price, 20 eur/mo) plan for free earlier than planned.

Oh, yeah, some telecoms have no interest in trying to get out of this, and have been doing some form of free roaming even before forced to. Ultimately, "we're not trying to screw you over" is a great marketing point; I'd say telecoms who try to resist will suffer in the marketplace.

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#45
post #4

So the cost incurred will be passed on to everyone in higher fees. eg people who never "roam" are going to be subsidising those people that do. A negative move spun as a positive... clever EU, clever.

Simply not true. Europe has true competition on telephone contracts, roaming fees were just a milking cow for all telcos to extract some additional income they now have to survive without.

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#46
post #4

So the cost incurred will be passed on to everyone in higher fees. eg people who never "roam" are going to be subsidising those people that do. A negative move spun as a positive... clever EU, clever.

that's alright, they'll just legislate to prevent price rises too

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#47

Yeah, the telcos have already found a way out. They simply remove EU roaming from their standard subscriptions and it now becomes an add-on. So if you want to use your phone in a different country during the holidays, you'll need an EU roaming subscription. The politicians once again failed to be sufficient precise in formulating a law that would produce the decided result. They should have added a clause that state…

This is not possible! The rule is clear: in every EU country you can use your mobile phone under the same conditions as in your base country (with some minor exceptions mostly for mobile data). Telcos not obeying this rule will be fined (or may even lose Radio Frequency License if not willing to obey).

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#48
post #29

Yeah, the telcos have already found a way out. They simply remove EU roaming from their standard subscriptions and it now becomes an add-on. So if you want to use your phone in a different country during the holidays, you'll need an EU roaming subscription. The politicians once again failed to be sufficient precise in formulating a law that would produce the decided result. They should have added a clause that state…

Phew. That's good to know. As someone who has absolutely no desire to ever need "roaming", it's good to know it won't be forced on people.

I'm a heavy EU roaming user and I truely welcome this change.

How does it feel to crosspay my phone bill? ;)

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#49
post #8

I never saw why this interference in the free market was needed when it was making progress, and in some circumstances already provided solutions to the problem on Three I've had free roaming for years, at no additional cost, across the EU and a good chunk of the rest of the world http://www.three.co.uk/feel-at-home

Restrictions:

If you roam exclusively in a Feel At Home destination for any 2 complete months in a rolling 12 month period, we may suspend international roaming on your account, which means you'll no longer be able to use your device or allowances abroad. We'd let you know if this were likely to happen first. If you spend a full month abroad but some of that time is spent in a destination that isn't included in Feel At Home, this restriction won't apply.

You can't use your phone as a Personal Hotspot, also called tethering, in a Feel At Home destination. This applies even if you normally tether in the UK using your data allowance, or have a Personal Hotspot allowance or Add-on.

We restrict your ability to use your data allowance for file-sharing, like peer to peer download services, and using certain sites to download or share large files. This is so that we can manage demand from overseas and ensure that everyone can use the service.

The source link is horrible (and the page doesn't allow copying... I wonder why): http://support.three.co.uk/SRVS/CGI-BIN/WEBISAPI.DLL?Command...

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#50

Yeah, the telcos have already found a way out. They simply remove EU roaming from their standard subscriptions and it now becomes an add-on. So if you want to use your phone in a different country during the holidays, you'll need an EU roaming subscription. The politicians once again failed to be sufficient precise in formulating a law that would produce the decided result. They should have added a clause that state…

Which telcos and in which country? Everything seems fine here in Croatia.

In Denmark it seems that most are remove EU roaming. I don't think 3 is, but Telia and CBB (Telenor subsidiary) are.

The CBB contract for example is adding 40DKK to the price, for EU coverage.

Post reply on HN