Orange has lots of posters at Heathrow telling travellers how they’re making roaming easier by having uniform charges so that you don’t have to search around for the cheapest network, and being part of something called the FreeMove Alliance.
But so much for all that, because the EU, in a display of astonishing arrogance, has decided to fuck up everybody’s business models.
They want to reduce roaming charges by 50% (actually by nearly 100% if you consider the implications of the update, below). What business is it of theirs? These are people who would (as I observed here) divide the world into managers, other white collar workers, manual workers, house people, self-employed people, artists, farmers, media people, students, researchers, public service people, local/regional authority people, those seeking work and retired people. Presumably, the idiotic thinking goes, most of those groups would like cheaper roaming charges, therefore we simply must intervene. Can’t have a free market deciding something as important to white collar workers and local and regional authorities as how much international phone bills cost. Never mind hard working people in the telecoms industry, people who made international mobile phone calls possible in the first place. Never mind people who have invested in these companies (presumably many of them retired pensioners). We must act for the Greater Good!
The BBC quotes the dispicable EU Information Society and Media Commissioner Viviane Reding: “It is high time that the EU’s internal market delivered substantially lower communication charges for consumers and business people travelling abroad,” she whines. I can just imagine her shrill, indignant old hag’s voice. “I therefore propose that an EU regulation be used to eliminate all unjustified roaming charges.” Unjustified according to who? Earth calling Viviane Reding: Any amount someone wants to charge for their services is justified if they say it is. If you don’t want to pay for it, tough shit, you can’t have it.
“A mobile phone customer should not be charged a higher tariff just because he is travelling abroad.” And what, because she thinks so, so shall it be? Who asked her anyway? I certainly didn’t. I didn’t even ask for an “Information Society and Media Commissioner”, whatever the hell that is supposed to be. Did anyone?  I doubt it.  Judging by how governments inexorably grow, one of Ms. Reding’s friends probably had some leftover budget. Either that or some moron civil servants were sat around at a brainstorming session. “I know what we could do: everyone write down 10 job title ideas for comissioners. Ooh, ‘Information Society’? That’s a good one, Julian, sounds all modern and PC at the same time. I think it would be better if we could fit ‘media’ in there somewhere, though.” That must be it. I can’t imagine people writing to their MP’s demanding, “we need an Information Society and Media Commissioner and we need one now! P.S. These mobile phone bills are just killing us!”
There is nothing European politicians can leave alone. Viviane Reding and her ilk are vermin. They are power-crazed, thieving meddlers and the sooner we are rid of them the better.
And, just for the record, I don’t work in the telecoms industry, and I will probably save money if these regulations come to pass. I don’t care. I don’t want little thugs running around trying to save me money.
Update:Â You can send your opinions on the proposed regulations, which would mean, “it would no longer be permissible for operators to levy charges on end customers receiving calls while roaming in the EU. Moreover, callers originating calls in the home country should not face any additional charge as a result of this provision”, to the public consultation.
Update 2:Â Here is the email I sent to the public consultation:
To the European Commission:
I am a private individual with no interest in the telecommunications industry. I am, however, astonished at the arrogance of the proposed regulation of international roaming.
These regulations should not exist in any form. There can be no moral justification for interfering in the business models of the enterprising people who have put great ingenuity and hard work into making international mobile phone calls possible.
Futhermore, the regulations as proposed are idiotic and short-sighted. Consider, “it would no longer be permissible for operators to levy charges on end customers receiving calls while roaming in the EU. Moreover, callers originating calls in the home country should not face any additional charge as a result of this provision”.
Any rational phone user would simply ask a recipient in his home country to call back. These regulations would therefore remove nearly all revenue from international roaming. This revenue will have to be made up elsewhere, and the regulations will fail to achieve even their own stated ends.
I regret that I am forced by taxation to contribute to the funding of the office of the Information Society and Media Commissioner.
Yours faithfully,
Rob Fisher,
London,
UK.
You’ve got me here – I’ve read it twice, slowly.
Let me just recap in case I missed something:
You’re going to save money.
Everyone is going to save money.
No-one is going to lose money.
And this is a bad thing why? Still don’t get it!
You can’t really be that slow, can you, Jon? I even gave specific examples of people losing money in the article. I’m more convinced every day that you don’t read what I write, just what you imagine I’d write.
Oh, God, I suppose I’ll spell it out. People who stand to lose money, from the article: “…hard working people in the telecoms industry, people who made international mobile phone calls possible in the first place”, “…people who have invested in these companies (presumably many of them retired pensioners)”; and this one, admittedly, requires a good two seconds or so of thought: given that “This revenue will have to be made up elsewhere”, everyone who doesn’t do much international roaming.
Not that that’s even the point. The point being: what business is it of the EU’s? Or to put it in a way even you might understand, what happens when the Viviane Redings of this world decide people are paying too much for their plumbers?
Would these be the same people who all paid a total of over £22.5 BILLION in tax in the 3G auction for the right to run a service which no one was bright enough to work out that there was no market for?
(For Americans reading this, we are referring to a British billion here, meaning the figure in question is £22,500,000,000,000 – quite staggering).
So Rob, you’re NOT a fan of Tax and Spend, but you’re happy to defend companies who take your money, put themselves heavily in debt, then form a cartel and massively overcharge on roaming fees?
Remember, there’s no competition here – roaming is a cartel, and one in which the clear margin is somewhere between 700% and 1000%. Surely any efficient company could reduce that margin a little?
With a plumber, you take your pick. With a mobile company, you don’t really have a roaming choice.
And please, infrastucture?? There are people who use the term “line rental”, without realising that, duh, it’s wireless!
You’re out by a factor of 1000 there, Jon. The 10^12 billion is rarely used any more, and is never used in finance. See this paper about the 3G auction by Oxford academics, which says “The exact total raised was £22,477.4 million”.
Those companies put themselves in debt for that license because that was the value of it to them then. It was an auction and it found the market value at the time. They didn’t hand over the money for fun. They may have over-valued the licenses, but they’re not answerable to you or I for their mistakes.
I don’t believe there is a roaming cartel. Mobile phone companies are hugely competitive because the market is saturated and they’re all desperate to keep their market share.
As an example, On Orange I pay £1.10 per minute from the USA to the UK on a pay-monthly tariff, no matter what network you call out on. Meanwhile, on an equivalent Vodaphone tariff I would have to use Cingular and pay £1.25 per minute for the same thing. If I want to save money there are about a gazillion calling cards to choose from. So I do have a choice.
Yes, there is a huge mark-up on international roaming. So what? A company is perfectly at liberty to subsidise one part of its business with another. Since most people are more interested in the cost of local calls it’s obvious where the larger mark-ups will be. Removing this option through regulation will only raise the cost of local calls as phone companies will try to maintain profits.
Line rental is a marketing term used because of its familiarity. Phone companies offer a range of tariffs and not all of them have a fixed monthly component.
I’m not sure where I used the word “infrastructure”, but it does exist. There are masts, routing equipment, and indeed wires involved.
None of all that matters, by the way. Even if there was a roaming cartel, it wouldn’t matter. Cartels are just an agreement between parties, and are unstable anyway because it only takes one to break the cartel.
There is a principle at stake here: that governments should not interfere in business. Business is made up of voluntary interactions between individuals. Nobody is forcing you to give money to mobile phone companies or plumbers. You only pay a pre-agreed amount for pre-agreed services. If you don’t like it, don’t buy it.
The reason I hate “tax and spend” is the tax part which involves force. Governments are all about force; the same force is used to make regulations.
If you don’t believe me, wait until someone does start making a fuss about the cost of plumbing, and see what regulations you’re forced to comply with. Invoking Niemöller is probably a bit strong, but if you don’t speak out when they go after the phone companies, you might regret it when they go after your business interests.