Actually I wanted to post the previous article which concerned the open conflict between GSM operators and our friend Viviane Reding. But the article is no longer available and, therefore, I attach a further article concerning GSM Association.

The article is in Italian, but the content is, if you stick to the basics, that GSMA claims they want to keep high roaming charges because they allow GSM operators to keep developping the new networks/technologies such as 3G. While, as you know if you have followed previous posts on this subject, Viviane Reding wants to reduce roaming charges.

The previous article mentioned the new initiatives adopted by Vodafone and Tim (having both operators recently introduced tariffs which consist of a 1 ? set up fee and then tariffs similar to national tariffs).

Still no mention in the "official" world of the offers such as united mobiles, hop etc.

teltarif.de does not yet have this as news.

However, they do report that certain CDU/CSU (conservative) representatives in their parliament are demanding lower international roaming rates. Calls back to Germany with cell phones can cost up to 2 Euro / minute from other EU countries. I don't really see anything new in the article.

No mention of UM, Hop, 09, etc as alternatives in the article. Their link in the article to roaming on their site also makes no mention of those alternatives.

There are some (a few) discussions (meinung) threads about such alternatives.

Seems the Europeans differ about high roaming costs. Consumers should be interested in saving money for themselves.

I think what will really lower EU's roaming rates is competition from UM, Hop etc. rather than goverment intervention.

Are you sure?

Of course, international SIMs which we like so much are often price-competitive, in some cases even better to compare with local SIMs.

But how about convenience of usage? If you have a "regular" SIM (i.e the which you use in your home country) and you roam with it, you are available worldwide on your home number and all your expenses abroad are charged together on the single invoice
(I don't say that this convenience should cost so much anyway :unsure: ...).

Notice how many posts on the forum is about diverting incoming calls from the "regular" number to Riiing/UM? It shows (at least to me) that some important feature of "standard" roaming is missing what makes international SIMs less competitive.

We can consider further issues (like handset compatibility for example) but IMHO all this reduces to something what I'd name "price-convenience trade-off".

Think e.g. about calling card business. Why the hell do something like calling cards exist at all? The "regular" operator of the landline phone on your desk, the mobile phone in your pocket or the payphone right the corner could (at least theoretically) lower its rates to the level at which nobody would like to "play" calling cards :) but things are diferrent - why?

Some good points Przemolog..

But, to me at least, call forwarding (which we call it in America) goes a step further...I call forward from my landline to my mobile phone while at home too..to me it's not just for international travel or even domestic travel...when I am out and about during the day, instead of people going into voice mail on my landline if they call me, they go right to my mobile phone whether I am in the car or at work (with the vibrator on of course) or whatever...when travelling I never give out my mobile number (nor the riiing number nor my UK number etc.)...I call forward from my landline to wherever.

That being said, it is no more difficult, at least for me, to call forward to United Mobile than it would be to call forward to Vodafone...it is totally transparent to the caller. What is difficult, of course, is getting the right price to call forward to united mobile on your carrier and the quality of the connection to FL...

It would be nice, I suppose, to be able to call forward to a better quality provider so to speak...to some degree Vodafone Passport does provide that at a price but in my case, right now today, it is far cheaper for me to call forward to umited mobile (11?/minute) than to a UK mobile (30?/minute) but at this point judging by what others are saying about FL rates, I suppose I am very lucky.

Call forwarding is part of the game, so to speak, with travel not the eternal search for the cheapest rate...

But here's what troubles me about the whole thing....T Mobile USA allows international roaming at the rate of 99?/minute to both make and receive calls in Western Europe (except for FL which is something like $1.49/minute)...and of course their preferred roaming partners are T mobile affiliated companies such as T Mobile UK, T Mobile DE etc. So when you question why so high, you are told basically this is what the other carrier charges us to a large degree with a small mark up...now the small mark up is fine....after all they are in it to make a profit. But to charge me to cover what T Mobile UK charges T Mobile USA to use their network is well almost criminal because all that is happening is theyh are taking money out of their left pocket and putting it in their right pocket.

Same thing is true with the excuse that Vodafone UK has high roaming rates because it has to cover what Vodafone DE charges them to use their network and all they are doing is passing along the costs along with their small mark up....give me a break.

And now both O2 IE and Vodafone IE have dropped roaming rates in the UK...what a revolutionary development.

No the high price of international roaming is for one thing and one thing only, to fatten their bottom lines on the backs of their consumers. It is not to cover costs.

More developments today: Irish (currently chairing EU) propose reducing roaming charges:

Things seem to be moving!

Your source?

They talked about it on Italian press today, I don't know if Sec just translated from Italian, anyway I can confirm it! :)

It was on the Italian news, as Effendi said.

Here is a complete article in English today, referring to yersterda's meeting:

http://www.computerworld.com/mobiletopics/...,109885,00.html

(PS: the text which I copied in my previous message was from an Irish website but a password was needed to access the article)

... but I do apologize for the mistake :blush: (not totatlly my fault: I just copied it from the article which was incorrect): it's Austria, not Ireland currently chairing the European Commission! The Irish, however, are very active in bringing forward the point concerning roaming.

http://www.infoworld.com/article/reuters/2..._L23314532.html