When does the roaming charge aboloshment go into effect?
From http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-14-373_en.htm :
"Today the European Parliament voted to end roaming charges by Christmas 2015"
EU votes net neutrality into law, abolishes mobile roaming charges
11–20 of 26 posts
Re: EU votes net neutrality into law, abolishes mobile roaming charges
#12I said it before in the other thread, but I guess it's worth reemphasizing: The abolishment of roaming charges is huge and could really establish a single telecoms market. This point has somehow been lost in all the excitement and discussions about net neutrality. Why is this huge? The differences between domestic rates and non-domestic rates are what kept the European Telecoms market from becoming truly European. As…
Being pessimistic... as the European Telecoms becomes "truly European", the carriers will probably start merging. Eventually you'll wind up where we are in the US, with a couple of huge carriers, a moderately sized carrier, and some small carriers that barely count. And then they'll start colluding, and providing poor service because they don't have to compete anymore. Welcome to the club.
It's about time to progressively tax (VAT, not profit) companies in "monopoly" markets.
Re: EU votes net neutrality into law, abolishes mobile roaming charges
#13I said it before in the other thread, but I guess it's worth reemphasizing: The abolishment of roaming charges is huge and could really establish a single telecoms market. This point has somehow been lost in all the excitement and discussions about net neutrality. Why is this huge? The differences between domestic rates and non-domestic rates are what kept the European Telecoms market from becoming truly European. As…
So one of two things happens, either rates go up to pay for lost revenue of no roaming or rates come down as players fight it out and remove their competition.
There will be probably be many cases where "technicalities" prevent one countries telecom from cooperating and such.
Re: EU votes net neutrality into law, abolishes mobile roaming charges
#14I said it before in the other thread, but I guess it's worth reemphasizing: The abolishment of roaming charges is huge and could really establish a single telecoms market. This point has somehow been lost in all the excitement and discussions about net neutrality. Why is this huge? The differences between domestic rates and non-domestic rates are what kept the European Telecoms market from becoming truly European. As…
Being pessimistic... as the European Telecoms becomes "truly European", the carriers will probably start merging. Eventually you'll wind up where we are in the US, with a couple of huge carriers, a moderately sized carrier, and some small carriers that barely count. And then they'll start colluding, and providing poor service because they don't have to compete anymore. Welcome to the club.
The EU can and will act to block mergers it considers to be anticompetitive.
Re: EU votes net neutrality into law, abolishes mobile roaming charges
#15It strikes me that the EU and the USA are really going in different directions in governmental philosophy. The EU seems to be moving toward regulation to assure QoS (if you will) for consumers and harmonization across jurisdictions, relying on business to make do within centrally established frameworks. The USA, on the other hand, is moving toward empowerment of established interests and relying on self-organization…
> It strikes me that the EU and the USA are really going in different directions in governmental philosophy.
You don't have the right perspective: The EU project since 2008 has show all of its flaws. It has been heavily jeopardized and it's in the brink of collapse. All these politicians in Brussels are not directly elected. Actually there's a huge discussion if they should be considered elected or appointed. Since the -crisis stepped in, the European Parliament has been reduced into a Clown. No decision is being made there and it's seen by the entire north and south as the mother of all evils. Germany is in control now.
So in order to get back some support, it is trying to become more social. Up until now the only good thing that ever came it was the ridiculous USB thing (where companies all use USB adapters and not different forms). Other than that, it did nothing to promote the values theoretically stands for.
And if all this sound naive, mind you, in my country Euro-philes were at a rate of 95% up until 2007, now it's less than 35%... They don't make gallops because local politicians are afraid of the results
Re: EU votes net neutrality into law, abolishes mobile roaming charges
#16I wonder what will be the unintended consequences of abolishing roaming fees?
One would probably be slower upgrades to 4G, 5G as things cost money and now carriers will have less for capex.
Re: EU votes net neutrality into law, abolishes mobile roaming charges
#17When does the roaming charge aboloshment go into effect?
From http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-14-373_en.htm : "Today the European Parliament voted to end roaming charges by Christmas 2015"
This doesn't mean anything yet ... the EU states still have to agree on this and this will take many more months before a final decision is made.
Re: EU votes net neutrality into law, abolishes mobile roaming charges
#18I said it before in the other thread, but I guess it's worth reemphasizing: The abolishment of roaming charges is huge and could really establish a single telecoms market. This point has somehow been lost in all the excitement and discussions about net neutrality. Why is this huge? The differences between domestic rates and non-domestic rates are what kept the European Telecoms market from becoming truly European. As…
But wouldn't it cost other people more money who want to get in touch with you if you did decide to go with a "non-domestic" carrier? For instance, if I have a non-German phone number, while living in Germany, and expecting people around here to call and text me? Or does that too fall under "roaming"? To me I think of roaming as being that I, with my German number, can still call and text other German numbers, and us…
I think you are right about that.
Roaming traditionally refers to using your phone outside of its network country. So calls to that phone will still be charged an international call charge.
Then again, if you have a data plan, coupled with some kind of VOIP service, you could effectively use your phone across all of Europe for the simple price of an unlimited data package.
Re: EU votes net neutrality into law, abolishes mobile roaming charges
#19I don't want to sound ungrateful, but the only reason Euro-politicians have put so much energy into, first, universal chargers, and now, roaming costs, is that they are some of the only issues that affect them directly, because of the extraordinary amount of air travel they do within the EU.
Re: EU votes net neutrality into law, abolishes mobile roaming charges
#20I don't want to sound ungrateful, but the only reason Euro-politicians have put so much energy into, first, universal chargers, and now, roaming costs, is that they are some of the only issues that affect them directly, because of the extraordinary amount of air travel they do within the EU.
I'm sure the politicians get their phone bill paid for them.