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Originally Posted by Przemolog
1. In theory, it might be so. But roaming always involves using the mobile infrastructure on two carriers instead of one. Why should the carrier pass some of its revenue to its roaming partner in order to provide free incoming calls, if it can keep it all and
charge extra the customer for incoming calls?
2. Neither burden nor additional cost. However, it uses the stranger network and must pay for it.
3. What is your point? Do you think that the German carrier should pass over the Rhine  some share of the 5 cents it gets from the calling party to its French partner? And it's because of the fact that a German customer roams in France doesn't affect the costs of either of the two operators? And moreover, one could even say that the German operator gets a chance to make some extra profits because the called party doesn't occupy its radio channels, but French ones
4. Do you think that such kind of "roaming status" really exists?
5. I believe that big guys are not really afraid of losing revenues because of international "free roaming" SIMs because they are aware of their disadvantages.
High initial cost, new foreign number, "strange" making calls, handset compatibility issues, lack of support in the customer's language - all this makes those products not so attractive as they might look at first sight.
I think that international SIMs are something like calling cards. Why do calling cards exist at all? Dialing an access number, PIN and destination number is always more complicated and takes more time than dialling just the destination number. PINless solution don't make it much shorter. My supposition is that big guys charge a lot for "just dial the number" convenience. "Usage complications" related with using international SIMs, calling cards (and callback services like CBW and any other workarounds for high rates....) IMHO make the products under consideration pretty uncompetitive |
Przemolog:
Replies to the ?s and apparent disagreements.
1. Indeed, two carriers, possibly more. In CPP for national countries, all incoming are free regardless of national network if national roaming is allowed, true? In DE, I believe O2 roams on D1, for intstance. This is not true for US, BTW. Some, but not all, carriers charge extra for roaming or they don't allow roaming at all. I would agree that, unless the carriers agree to some kind of revenue sharing, there is no reason why EITHER the home country carrier of the roaming party or the network on which the roamer is registered in the foreign country should share revenues.
Why? How is SFR to bill the German's E+ account without going thru E+ to collect? You think SFR knows the balance on the E+ account and bills the user's account directly? I find that very hard to believe, but it may be true. There must be some kind of handshake between the two networks for communication AND billing info.
See also below.
2. "must pay" as in ALWAYS? Why? We have several examples of the international cards where the roamer does not pay for inbound, so "must pay" cannot be 100 % correct. Certainly, apart from the internationals with FREE INBOUND, the roamer DOES pay. And then you have Vodafon where you can find reduced inbound (and outbound) rates as long as you stay on the Vodafon network while roaming. And, if you agree there is technically no additional burden or cost on the networks other than doing whatever is needed for the interconnect, then the fact that the non-national roamer receives a call outside his national borders is simply another revenue opportunity or event, and a lucrative one at that. The major alternatives are: (1) keep phone off; (2) use phone and pay; (3) use another SIM with all the disadvantages other than low price to receive and make calls for the roamer. [And I might add that one should consider ALL costs; I refilled a my Malta Go twice for ~50 Euros over two years, made some calls, sents some SMSs, had some security while there and sold the thing for 7 Euros leaving a 45 Euro balance on the SIM. Not very smart, true? Also, when you consider I paid about the same for the Vodafon Malta card AND LOST IT OUTRIGHT, I took a real bath on these cards.]
And obviously, the interconnections work on landlines for international calls, so the costs are already FIXED for the most part as postulated above. BUT there must be a billing exchange from the host country network to the origin country network. I am lead to believe these intra-network bookings happen quite rapidly, so I am guessing there are revenue sharing agreements established to accomodate this. How else could WIND know a German's E+ account balance and bill him for the call received (or made)? Which brings up an interesting quesiton of if an account balance can actually go negative especially while roaming? I thought I read over @ T-MO DE (one of the PDFs) that negative balances could occur in just such roamking instances and that a refill would be needed to make up for the negative balance.
3. I guess my point is this: when you dial from your home phone to a foreign destination, you are expecting to pay more for that call due to the greater distance or use of the satellite or foreign network. That is certainly NOT TRUE when you call another national mobile from within your country. And, of course, the CALLER in your CPP coutnries does not pay extra - ever, as long as the caller is dialing and is registered on his or a national network. Since CPP rules out the collection of any additional fees (I think so, anyway) in this case (call to foreign destination), it is understandable and rational that the receiving party must pay something additional for the interconnect and extra distance. One can of course dispute how much EXTRA that fee should be. And we are right back to our main topic about how can UM, 09, etc offer free inbound in 80 (whatever) countries!
4. Just guessing, but it seems that this kind of "roaming status" does exit. Certainly, UM and the like do not have that much market clout to dictate to the biggies that inbound should be free, do they? So why would the biggies treat them differently from their biggie rivals? What explanations have been given or do you have?
5. You may be correct. At any rate, it does not appear that the big guys appear ready to shut off UM, 09, etc. just yet.
Thanks for the lively discussion!
Stan