EU postpones roaming cap decision
As negotiations continue
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The Brussels vote on capping mobile phone roaming charges has been postponed until the next plenary session, scheduled for 21 to 24 May.
The vote was due to take place today, but negotiations between the commission, European Parliament, and council are still ongoing.
The basic concept, that the EU will cap the amount operators can charge for international roaming within the EU, is pretty much settled, but the amount at which that cap should be set is still open to debate.
Not that the proposed cap will make a huge difference to most customers. New research sponsored by VoIP provider Truphone suggests that 81 per cent of people are unsure how much it costs to make or receive calls abroad, and almost 40 per cent think that calls will still be overpriced even if they are capped.
More interestingly, 16 per cent of those surveyed will be using their phone outside the EU this year, so the cap won't reduce their costs and could even increase them as operators seek to maintain their profits. ®
COMMENTS
Uncertainty
The Moguls of the EU used to be uncertain but now they are not so sure. It's like the old daye of Order, Counterorder, Disorder. I rest my case.
Don't Pay, Won't Pay
Okay I thought these folks would soon be out of business but here are a couple of Int'l SIM providers -
http://www.awayphone.com/
http://www.oneroam.co.uk/
No doubt there are many others but I use OneRoam. You have to use a special number to get a cheap rate to ring their numbers (Estonian mobiles) but from the SIM most of Europe is 27p/min and free incoming.
In the US I just buy a Tracfone and divert my UK numbers to my VoIP number which is in turn diverted to the Tracfone number. It takes 5 mins to set up and saves £100's. Tracfone have a calling card number for int'l, use of which is included in Tracfone minutes (read no extra charge to ring the UK from the US).
I know I'm a techie but anybody can do this stuff.
Rip Off Roaming Charges...
Its about time that roaming charges are reduced as mobile firms have ripped of customers and profited way too much on this for too long!!
Its scandalous that it has not been sorted well before now. I went away last year and ended up with a huge bill for sending texts which did not come out of my allowance and cost me 40p each. But to make it worse, Although I didn't use my phone whilst abroad i got £16 worth of charges because people tried to ring me and i didn't answer due to the cost incurred by me but was STILL charged as the calls were directed to my answering machine.
Lets hope the price agreed by the EU means that customers can see BIG savings whilst using their mobiles abroad. They should not be charged at all for receiving calls and to be honest most of the companies abroad are owned by the same ones in the UK anyway such as who owns O2 or being connected to Vodafone Spain so the argument of being charged for networks abroad carrying the call is utter boll@$*%
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