Jersey, IOM & RSM

[Przemolog]

Originally Posted by DRNewcomb

Here's a bit longer discussion about these Iowa rural phone companies.

Thanks for the link. So, if I understand correctly, the whole Iowa tariff "mess" is caused by the fact that in sparsely populated rural areas the costs of creating the telecom infrastructure (mainly cables, I think) per subscriber are very high, while the expected revenues aren't.

Going back to the subject of the thread - why are international SIMs are "home-based" in small European countries. Of course, the fact they are often a kind of "tax paradises" may play some role but the main reason is that their telecom companies have "no room" to grow on local markets. I suppose that there is similar reason for which GSM-on-ships services are also often provided by companies from small countries (and at least in two cases are the same companies which provide roaming agreements for international SIMs).

I checked roaming partners list of the Polish mobile operators looking for GSM-onships roamings and I found the following

Large countries based
MCP - Norway (an operator "specialised" in "on-ships" roaming)
TIM - Italy
ATT - USA

Small countries based
OceanCell - Landsimmin Iceland
Seanet - Vodafone Malta
P&T Luxembourg
Jersey Telecom
Manx Telecom

Perhaps someone of you knows more examples.

[DRNewcomb]

Originally Posted by Przemolog

Going back to the subject of the thread - why are international SIMs are "home-based" in small European countries. Of course, the fact they are often a kind of "tax paradises" may play some role but the main reason is that their telecom companies have "no room" to grow on local markets.

I think it may have something to do with the willingness of the telecoms administration to set up a special termination rate for a particular group of mobile numbers, or perhaps that there is already a high termination rate. I believe that this may be the case in both Man and Jersey with the added benefit that most international carriers lump them in with UK so that the impact of the higher rate is diluted.

[Przemolog]

Originally Posted by DRNewcomb

I think it may have something to do with the willingness of the telecoms administration to set up a special termination rate for a particular group of mobile numbers, or perhaps that there is already a high termination rate. I believe that this may be the case in both Man and Jersey with the added benefit that most international carriers lump them in with UK so that the impact of the higher rate is diluted.

Yes, I agree with you that the high termination rate is the key factor that makes the whole "free incoming roaming" profitable.
But then there is another question, related to "particular group of mobile numbers" - why don't telecoms which provide roaming agreements for international SIMs don't offer the same free incoming calls (and low outgoing rates when abroad) to their "home" customers, neither postpaid nor prepaid ones? E.g. Manx Telecom customers can enjoy free incoming calls in English-language European countries only (UK, Ireland, Channel Islands).

My supposition is they can't do this because termination fees are applicable only for off-net calls (incoming from other operators) whereas the customers pay for their on-net minutes much below the termination fee. Let's say the operator charges 20 cents/min for incoming off-net calls and, thanks to this rate it can pass up to 15 cents/min to pay the termination of the call in the roaming partner's network. That's why it is able to offer free incoming calls in any roaming network with termination rate <=15 cents/min. But if the operator serves also on-net calls which due to number of inclusives minutes, lower per minute rates, packets, rebates etc. bring to it on average 10 cents/min only. In order to offer free incoming calls in roaming everywhere it costs <=15 cents to terminate, it would have either raise the on-net rates or subsidise its own customers.

To summarise, I think that high termination rate is not enough. Another necessary condition is that all (or almost all) calls to international SIMs are off-net calls or least they are charged as off-net calls. BTW, I wonder if e.g. calls from "local" +44 7624 SIMs to "international" ones are charged at on-net or off-net rates?