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Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

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Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#341

Post by yxhuvud »

ptaipale wrote: post #298
rhino369 wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't go by pure density. Imagine if you transported Mexico City into Antartica. It would be sparsely populated, but highly concentrated. Cellar coverage would be easy. Are rural areas in Sweden dominated by small, fairly dense towns? In America, even small cities are sprawling because of cars. People will live 10 miles outside of a small town of 3000 people.

Rural areas in Sweden and Finland are dominated by forests, swamps and lakes. You've got 3G or 4G practically everywhere.

And mountains, not to forget. Though the coverage up in the mountains is not always great if you are away from populated areas.

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#342

Post by ptaipale »

yxhuvud wrote: post #341
ptaipale wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rural areas in Sweden and Finland are dominated by forests, swamps and lakes. You've got 3G or 4G practically everywhere.

And mountains, not to forget. Though the coverage up in the mountains is not always great if you are away from populated areas.

Yes, real mountains in Sweden and fells in Finland. Still, where you have a dwelling, you usually also have coverage.

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#343

Post by ptaipale »

vidarh wrote: post #313
ptaipale wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then have the roaming charge regulated to 7€ per terabyte, instead of 7€ per gigabyte as now.

Maybe eventually, but the point is they had to start somewhere, and 7 per GB is still a substantial reduction. The EU parliament wanted to go much further, starting at 4 and gradually reducing to 1. They'll get pushed further down eventually, but at the same time nobody wants to overdo this and cause problems for these providers by going too fast.

My point is that they should regulate the extractive pricing between operators before they regulate the pricing operators have to give to end customers.

Now those operators that have been competitive will suffer. Those that have been extractive towards their own customers and their competitors will benefit.

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#344

Post by raarts »

ptaipale wrote: post #299
kaybe wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would anyone get a plan without roaming? Looking at the size of European countries that would be unthinkable for anyone I know. Unless it's.. free or something. Maybe then.

I use LTE for my home's main internet connection, and it will never roam. (I can't get fiber without paying five digits sums of €, and ADSL is around 3 Mbit/s). So, if prices rise due to roaming charges, I'm paying more and get nothing.

Can you Netflix?

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#345

Post by ptaipale »

raarts wrote: post #344
ptaipale wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use LTE for my home's main internet connection, and it will never roam. (I can't get fiber without paying five digits sums of €, and ADSL is around 3 Mbit/s). So, if prices rise due to roaming charges, I'm paying more and get nothing.

Can you Netflix?

Yes, that's the bulk of traffic of course, although it's mostly the kids, not me.

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#346

Post by ptaipale »

girvo wrote: post #337
Paul-ish wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is wireless as bad as those three?

My understanding is yes, it is, mainly because spectrum is a limited resource

However, it's not as bad. You can't practically build another set of power or water distribution grid, but you can assign new frequencies to new operators. There's a limit on how many you can have, but you can have way more than with those services where there is a physical pipe or line to each point of consumption.

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#347

Post by ptaipale »

nunobrito wrote: post #271
HNBRN wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

However the situation is much better now. It was very common for us French people to discover a huge roaming bill after a trip in another European country. At least roaming cost are becoming predictable

Yep. Still remember when I got charged 8 EUR just for being close to the border with the Czech Republic but still within our side of the border. They made a lot of money with this roaming business.

All GSM and later digital phones, starting with Nokia 2110 and its contemporaries, had an option to refuse roaming - just to avoid accidental phone bills like this.

(I think the 1st generation NMT network in Nordic countries also had the same, though I am not sure as I never owned one.)

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#348

Post by ptaipale »

rainingtomorrow wrote: post #143
imron wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, because it appears the Latvians are now subsidising your roaming charges.

And the French are subsidising Latvian agriculture, universities, roads, and infrastructure. I don't think it's fair to evaluate this policy isolated from the rest of EU policies.

The French are subsidising French agriculture and so is everyone else in EU.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Agricultural_Policy

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#349

Post by mrsuprawsm »

mrweasel wrote: post #14

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 legal.

Re: Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today

#350

Post by vsl »

rainingtomorrow wrote: post #140
endijs wrote: post #63

This idea was good. But in reality what happened in Latvia was very simple and expected move by telcos - all three of them raised prices for all subscriptions by about 3€-4€ monthly (which is ~30% increase). Yes, now you can feel better while traveling, however everyone now pays extra every single month. For some situation now is better, while others pay for it even if they do not need such freedom. Those who are in…

Latvia and Lithuania have literally the cheapest telco services in Europe. It's no surprise that we have to pay a bit more now. Yes, we lose this time, but for the rest of the Europe it's a huge win.

My telco cancelled roaming on data-only plans altogether in reaction. Such a huge win.

Virtual operators, who don't get any roaming income, still have to pay high roaming fees to other telcos and now can't even charge their expenses to customers are basically screwed and have to increase prices. Such a huge win.

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