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Two Countries, Two Vastly Different Phone Bills

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Re: Two Countries, Two Vastly Different Phone Bills

#51

Post by chrismeller »

martinald wrote: post #41
chrismeller wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're not taking into account population density. Russia's population is very heavily concentrated in relatively few areas... Not much need to blanket all of Siberia with cell towers.

Same as the US surely? There's huge swathes of the US which has very limited cell coverage. Looking at a map, the majority of OR/ID/MT/ND/SD doesn't have cell coverage, not even 2G. Apparently more than 83% of the US population lives in urban environments, compared to 73% in Russia. In fact, it's more than the UK too (80%).

To some extent, definitely. But America has always had the "open road" attitude. I think it's a lot more likely for a family to take a road trip to the Grand Canyon one summer, across several of those states, than for a Russian family to take a road trip to... hell, I can't find a city in the middle of Siberia on Google Maps, but you get the idea.

Re: Two Countries, Two Vastly Different Phone Bills

#52

Post by joosters »

anemitz wrote: post #47

It's worth noting that the billing methods for US and the rest of Europe are very different when it comes to voice. For instance, it costs between 4c/min to 26c/min to call a UK mobile phone. In the US it's The more interesting question I have is why would it cost 26c/min to call a mobile phone? And since each carrier prefix may have a different cost, how do consumers keep all these prefixes / carrier rates straight…

The maximum that a UK mobile company can charge for an international call in the EU is 18p/minute, around 29c. Same-country calls are naturally cheaper.

Another thing to consider is that off-plan call rates are certainly high, but since you could get a better plan for less than the cost of an off-plan call, you won't be making many of them.

Generally all carriers are covered by any plan minutes so you don't have to worry about differing charges. Ironically though, in the UK, calls to freephone numbers are mostly not included in plans so they do cost money...

Re: Two Countries, Two Vastly Different Phone Bills

#53

Post by joosters »

abritishguy wrote: post #20
chrismeller wrote: post #19

I would think that one of the "several factors involved" may dwarf regulation: area. The UK operators have 94,000 square miles to cover while US operators have a little over 3.1 million, just in the lower 48. Obviously no single carrier is ever going to cover 100% of either country (and in the US in in particular they don't come even close), but the simple size of the problem in the US drives their infrastructure cos…

Well that doesn't explain why it is cheaper for me as a Brit to roam using my UK contract in the US than it is to take out a US contract. When I'm visiting America I am literally paying less than you folks for your stuff. I can go to US and use unlimited data for no extra charge.

That's not true in general. UK phone companies love to charge astronomical international rates when they can get away with it. Only EU maximum charge limits have capped these.

For example, in an EU country like Greece, I can phone a UK number for a maximum of 18p/minute. If I happen to travel near the border with Turkey and connect via one of their networks, there's no regulatory maximum price and the cost jumps to 69p.

Re: Two Countries, Two Vastly Different Phone Bills

#54

Post by abritishguy »

joosters wrote: post #53
abritishguy wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well that doesn't explain why it is cheaper for me as a Brit to roam using my UK contract in the US than it is to take out a US contract. When I'm visiting America I am literally paying less than you folks for your stuff. I can go to US and use unlimited data for no extra charge.

That's not true in general. UK phone companies love to charge astronomical international rates when they can get away with it. Only EU maximum charge limits have capped these. For example, in an EU country like Greece, I can phone a UK number for a maximum of 18p/minute. If I happen to travel near the border with Turkey and connect via one of their networks, there's no regulatory maximum price and the cost jumps to 6…

It doesn't matter about it being true in general - the fact that any UK networks allow you to have unlimited data in America for no extra cost on a contract that is much much cheaper than US contracts shows that the US carriers are screwing you - I pay £15 a month (no contract - I can stop whenever I want) and that includes unlimited data in America.

Re: Two Countries, Two Vastly Different Phone Bills

#55

Post by joosters »

abritishguy wrote: post #54
joosters wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not true in general. UK phone companies love to charge astronomical international rates when they can get away with it. Only EU maximum charge limits have capped these. For example, in an EU country like Greece, I can phone a UK number for a maximum of 18p/minute. If I happen to travel near the border with Turkey and connect via one of their networks, there's no regulatory maximum price and the cost jumps to 6…

It doesn't matter about it being true in general - the fact that any UK networks allow you to have unlimited data in America for no extra cost on a contract that is much much cheaper than US contracts shows that the US carriers are screwing you - I pay £15 a month (no contract - I can stop whenever I want) and that includes unlimited data in America.

What you're saying though is still not true:

I can go to US and use unlimited data for no extra charge.

There is a charge; it's part of your contract package. I'm sure it's a fantastic deal and for a traveler who uses mobile data in the US, it makes a lot of sense. But Three aren't doing this out of the goodness of their hearts. The charge for this data is part of your phone plan. Three (or another network) could provide an alternate package that didn't provide 'free' US data for a lower monthly cost.

Re: Two Countries, Two Vastly Different Phone Bills

#56

Post by abritishguy »

joosters wrote: post #55
abritishguy wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't matter about it being true in general - the fact that any UK networks allow you to have unlimited data in America for no extra cost on a contract that is much much cheaper than US contracts shows that the US carriers are screwing you - I pay £15 a month (no contract - I can stop whenever I want) and that includes unlimited data in America.

What you're saying though is still not true: I can go to US and use unlimited data for no extra charge. There is a charge; it's part of your contract package. I'm sure it's a fantastic deal and for a traveler who uses mobile data in the US, it makes a lot of sense. But Three aren't doing this out of the goodness of their hearts. The charge for this data is part of your phone plan. Three (or another network) could pro…

You don't get it, the cost of my contract is much much cheaper (we are talking 25% of the price) than any unlimited US contract and yet it includes the same stuff.

Re: Two Countries, Two Vastly Different Phone Bills

#57

Post by oliverdavenport »

xSwag wrote: post #43
cstross wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Other things about Three: * The monthly contracts (and higher value pay-as-you-go top-ups) come with "Feel at Home" roaming -- in about 12 countries worldwide you can use your inclusive minutes, texts and data with no international roaming fees, i.e. you get that all-you-can-eat data overseas . Countries listed include the United States; on one recent 2-week trip to the USA I was able to use my iPhone for data as if…

> The all-you-can-eat is capped (small print) at a "fair usage" of 25 Gb/month. I can tell you that this is wrong, I've personally had months where I've used 100GB+ of data over 3G and had no problems (this is on a £15 top-up). I don't know if they throttle or not, I've never really noticed it. > Tethering is disabled while roaming overseas on "feel at home", but not prevented at home. I didn't get my handset from Th…

The limit only applies when roaming with Feel at Home (free roaming). Data is capped at 25GB, and I think calls are capped at 300 mins and texts at 3000, too.

When not roaming, there is no limit on data:

> "Does all you can eat data come with any limits? The limit is how much your device can consume – if you were to actively use data or the Internet on your phone every second, of every day, in every month (and we would be worried if you were !!!!) you would, subject to the current traffic management requirements (which vary from time to time), use up to 1000GB per month. So in essence there is a limit of how much data you can actually consume which is up to 1000GB. All this means that you can have absolute peace of mind and enjoy all the internet you need on your smartphone, without worrying."

(http://www.three.co.uk/Privacy_Cookies/Terms_Conditions?cont...)

Re: Two Countries, Two Vastly Different Phone Bills

#58

Post by jackgavigan »

abritishguy wrote: post #31

I would like to point out that the following part of the article is not true (she was probably getting confused with broadband): "Britain has forced companies to lease their networks to competitors at cost"

Actually, the original mobile network licences issued back in the '80s required that the licence-holders sell airtime to any service provider who asks for it, at the same price and conditions offered to the service providers owned/controlled by the licence-holders. That paved the way for MVNOs.

Re: Two Countries, Two Vastly Different Phone Bills

#59

Post by anemitz »

martinald wrote: post #49
anemitz wrote: post #47

It's worth noting that the billing methods for US and the rest of Europe are very different when it comes to voice. For instance, it costs between 4c/min to 26c/min to call a UK mobile phone. In the US it's The more interesting question I have is why would it cost 26c/min to call a mobile phone? And since each carrier prefix may have a different cost, how do consumers keep all these prefixes / carrier rates straight…

Not correct and I don't know where you get those prices from. OFCOM has regulated termination charges ( http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/consultations/mtr/statement ) in the UK. Right now they are at 0.8p/min but it is likely they are going to rule to drop them to below 0.5p/min. Edit: these are wholesale prices, so there will be some overheads for whoever provides it to end users, but the crazy termination fees in t…

Where does the overhead come when you look at rates from carriers like http://flowroute.com/rates/ or https://www.plivo.com/pricing/GB/ or http://www.twilio.com/voice/pricing/gb

It might be that wholesale rates are capped but it clearly isn't pushing prices down for consumers who want to call into mobile numbers.

Re: Two Countries, Two Vastly Different Phone Bills

#60

Post by martinald »

anemitz wrote: post #59
martinald wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not correct and I don't know where you get those prices from. OFCOM has regulated termination charges ( http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/consultations/mtr/statement ) in the UK. Right now they are at 0.8p/min but it is likely they are going to rule to drop them to below 0.5p/min. Edit: these are wholesale prices, so there will be some overheads for whoever provides it to end users, but the crazy termination fees in t…

Where does the overhead come when you look at rates from carriers like http://flowroute.com/rates/ or https://www.plivo.com/pricing/GB/ or http://www.twilio.com/voice/pricing/gb It might be that wholesale rates are capped but it clearly isn't pushing prices down for consumers who want to call into mobile numbers.

2.65c/min on Plivo? The other prefixes are more 'premium rate' numbers, not mobile numbers. That's about 1.5p/min.

Considering Plivo charges 1.2c/min for US numbers as a benchmark, the difference between US and UK numbers is 1.45c/min or... 0.88p/min, exactly the wholesale cost pretty much. So I think it is working.

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