EU: Voice and Text Roaming Costs Halved Since 2007, Data Still Costly
Voice and text roaming rates in Europe are down by 50 per cent from 2007, with very few prices applied below the roaming price cap that was set by the European Commission, according to a report from Tariff Consultancy Ltd. (TCL). However, the average retail price for mobile data roaming within the European Union is five times the wholesale price.
About 90 per cent of European mobile operators have chosen to position their EU voice roaming tariff close to the cap, which is acting as the de facto price standard.
But mobile roaming data rates are on average EUR 5.4, 5 times the EUR 1 per MB wholesale rate, though individual operator data roaming rates vary from below the wholesale cap to more than 10 times the cap rate.
Besides, a characteristic of the introduction of the EU roaming cap has been the change in roaming pricing to other regions outside of the European Union.
Operators have sought to offset the revenue limiting effects of the EU roaming cap by re-balancing roaming tariffs outside the EU. Some operators have altered the geographical zones which has resulted in higher prices for roaming customers in certain countries, in particular Norway, Switzerland, the USA and countries in the Asia-Pacific region.
The net effect of this re-balancing of tariffs has been to make roaming services to the US or other countries relatively expensive by comparison with the EU:
- The price of a roaming voice call from the EU zone to the next geographical tariff zone has an average markup of 200 per cent.
- The price of text roaming outside the EU zone to the next geographical zone has an average markup of 160 per cent.
- The price of mobile data roaming outside the EU zone to the next geographical zone has an average markup of 270 per cent.
Read the full press release.
Source: Tariff Consultancy, Cellular News
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