61–70 of 359 posts
I'm wondering why the regulation was necessary and why the free market forces didn't bring the prices or roaming down? What are the forces in telecom industry that kept the prices so high (assuming that the prices were higher then necessary)?
What is the correct European SIM to buy for data/voice/etc. (prepaid)? Presumably best to get one from a country you don't actually visit much, so you're always roaming, and thus don't pay the home to foreign number charges?
Edited: It's interesting to see how comment which states facts, can get upvoted and downvoted this much. Sometimes voting in HN does not make any sense (to me). I understand that upvote is "thanks for letting us know those facts". What are downvotes representing? That I should not write at all, that price increase for all 3 telcos is fine, that everyone should be happy? Rhetorical question.
I'm wondering why the regulation was necessary and why the free market forces didn't bring the prices or roaming down? What are the forces in telecom industry that kept the prices so high (assuming that the prices were higher then necessary)?
2. Collusion
It's also why phone services are so much more expensive in the US than say France.
I'm wondering why the regulation was necessary and why the free market forces didn't bring the prices or roaming down? What are the forces in telecom industry that kept the prices so high (assuming that the prices were higher then necessary)?
Under these circumstances, mandated cooperation would make sense to me.
I'm wondering why the regulation was necessary and why the free market forces didn't bring the prices or roaming down? What are the forces in telecom industry that kept the prices so high (assuming that the prices were higher then necessary)?
I'm wondering why the regulation was necessary and why the free market forces didn't bring the prices or roaming down? What are the forces in telecom industry that kept the prices so high (assuming that the prices were higher then necessary)?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is still a cost. And that cost is going to be passed on to everyone whether you use it or not.
The abolishing of roaming charges also applies between operators. As the true technical cost for roaming is negligible there is really no passing of charges from those who use it to those who don't.
So, e.g. Telia doesn't have to pay any roaming charge to WIND Hellas if a Telia customer from Sweden goes to Greece and connects that network?
Previously I heard a cap of 7 € per gigabyte for data fees was regulated.
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…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wrong. If tourist movement is spread out across Europe equally, then mostly nobody will need to subsidize anything, since the mobile operators will be paying each other. Of course, cost per GB is different in some regions, but interestingly most popular tourist places are on the Mediterranean where data plans cost less.
> If tourist movement is spread out across Europe equally It's not.
Also there are protection plans in the policy for the extremely unlikely scenario that a company is not making a net profit.