EU cracks down on mobile phone charges

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After giving us some of the world's lowest airfares, the EU now strikes on mobile operators to assure EU consumers don't get cheated within the EU.

BBC News : EU cracks down on mobile charges

BBC said:
Mobile phone users could pay less for making calls from abroad to their country of origin, under proposals put forward by the European Commission.

The Commission said it would draft a law to crack down on "unjustified" high charges for using mobile phones abroad.

The proposals seek to scrap all roaming charges for receiving a call when travelling abroad in the EU.

They also aim to make the cost of calls made abroad the same as those made in the user's country of origin.

Expatica : EU to cut mobile phone charges

Expatica said:
Under the new proposal, mobile phone companies will be forced to charge the normal national rates from the user's home country.

This means a French tourist in Spain will be able to call a taxi at French local rates and will only be charged more for international calls.

Mobile phone users abroad would also no longer be charged to receive a call.

Reding said if the European Parliament and the Council agreed quickly to the new measures, consumers could already see the financial benefits by the summer of 2007.

Here is what the problem is :

EU Commission said:
The updated Commission website launched today – which is available in English, French, German, Italian, Spanish and Polish – shows that for a four-minute call, roaming prices still vary from as little as €0.20 for a Finnish consumer calling home from Sweden to €13.05 for a four-minute call by a Maltese consumer in Latvia. In some cases, roaming prices have even increased over the past six months: In the UK, one operator has increased the price for roaming from €3.45 to €4.92 when consumers call home across the EU. Lithuanian customers are charged for a four minute call from France between €4.41 and a staggering €12.08.

Source : EU Commission

For details about the actual cost charged by mobile phones operators in each EU country, please refer to the European Commission page on mobile pricing.
 
It is high time these new rules be implemented ! France's Bouygues Telecom charged me 1.173 euro for every single call from France to Belgium that lasted just one or two seconds because I got their voicemail. 1.173 euro per second for a call made 350km away is not expensive, it is outrageous !
 
Roaming charges will drop again, for text messages this time, with a 11-eurocent cap. Currently the average SMS sent outside one's own country costs 28 cent. New tariffs should come into force next year.

BBC News : EU to slash more mobile charges
 

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