The European Commission has presented a proposal for a long-term solution to the continued high cost of using mobile phones and other mobile devices while travelling in the EU, known as mobile roaming. The announcement was made a few days after another reduction in mobile roaming charges in the EU were announced.
The Commission said that directly binding regulation proposed would, for the first time, introduce structural measures to boost competition by allowing customers from July 1, 2014, if they so wish, to sign up for a cheaper mobile roaming contract, separate from their contract for national mobile services, while using the same phone number.
The proposal would also give mobile operators (including so-called virtual mobile operators, who do not have their own network) the right to use other operators’ networks in other member states at regulated wholesale prices, and so encourage more operators to compete on the roaming market.
Last week i-Tech reported how Malta had been singled out for the excessively high mobile roaming tariffs incurred by the Maltese until a few years ago and how this prompted the European Commission to intervene and lower down the roaming tariffs, today known as the ‘Eurotariff’.
To cover the period until structural measures become fully effective and competition drives retail prices down, the Commission’s proposal would progressively lower current retail price caps on voice and texting (SMS) services and introduce a new retail price cap for mobile data services.
By July 1, 2014, roaming consumers will pay no more than 24 cents per minute to make a call, a maximum 10 cents per minute to receive a call, maximum 10 cents to send a text message and maximum 50 cents per Megabyte (MB) to download data or browse the internet while travelling abroad (charged per Kilobyte used).
Neelie Kroes, European Commission Vice President for the Digital Agenda, said: “This proposal tackles the root cause of the problem – the lack of competition on roaming markets – by giving customers more choice and by giving alternative operators easier access to the roaming market. It would also immediately bring down prices for data roaming, where operators currently enjoy outrageous profit margins.”
The proposal aims to meet the objective set in the Digital Agenda for Europe that differences between roaming and national telecoms tariffs should approach zero by 2015. This objective will be met if competition in mobile markets gives consumers a rapid and easy choice of roaming service at, or close to, domestic prices. The proposal will be submitted to the European Parliament and EU’s Council of Ministers for adoption.
A report just adopted by the Commission on the current roaming regulation indicates that it has temporarily reduced prices for roaming phone calls and text messages but has not remedied the lack of competition in the roaming market, with prices remaining stubbornly close to the retail caps. This confirms findings of the preliminary report published on June 30, 2010.