Does Anyone Know the REAL Roaming Costs Incurred by Carriers?

[MATHA531]

Originally Posted by snidely

When VodaFone UK makes a roaming agreement w. ATT or T-Mobile in the U.S., what do they really pay ATT or T-M when a customer of theirs roams here? I am sure it's a small fraction of the HIGH rates they are now charging their customer.
An indication of this outrageous example in my case. I am grandfathered in on intl. roaming rates where T-Mobile charges 29-31 cents for incoming calls in many countries around the world. Present users pay $1/min in most of these countries - but $2 ($3?)/min. in Israel!! This is for incoming and outgoing. On my plan, if I didn't use a callback service and dialed direct, i would be paying 70 cents to $1.70 for outgoing.

Point is - It would seem if T-M weren't still making money on my rate plan, they would cancel it. It would guess that at some point one major carrier will attempt to capture the international roaming market and drastically reduce the rates. If/when this happens, the International roaming SIM is done for.

It would take just one major company to do this. The others would have to follow. Here in the U.S., when Sprint suddenly offered unlimited voice (in and out) for $99/mo., ATT, T-M, and Verizon followed within a couple days. If T-M U.S. offered everyone the same rates I pay, they could capture a lot of the world intl. market. It would pay non-U.S. users to sign up w. T-M here. Incoming 30 cents. Outgoing via callback service, about 7 cents more. European customers could forward calls from their landline to a U.S. number for less than 2 cents.

...mike

Well that is sort of what I said in the other thread....it really does gall me about international roaming rates, especially on the part of T Mobile USA when, as I've said at other times, if one roams on T Mobile UK, obstensibly part of the rate is what T Mobile USA has to pay to T Mobile UK for use of their network; well I'm sorry that's analogous to taking money out of the left pocket and putting it into the right pocket...they are both fully owned by Deutsches Telecom. It is a rip off.

The problem is we have only the two gsm carriers in the USA and quite frankly, few Americans think it's important to use a cell phone...all sorts of advice is not to use a cell phone but to use calling cards and use the cell phone only in emergencies. I missed out on the grandfathered rates when I began to understand gsm, sim cards and all that other stuff. So of course, I gravitated to the international cards. I remember a time when I was impressed by Virgin Mobile offering 15p/minute calls to the USA and free reception of calls in the UK...then when I travelled to France I got a French sim, Germany a German sim, Holland a Dutch sim....luckily for me my landline carrier is just about the only one that allows remote call forwarding to international phones although I tried Kall8 and voicestick for call forwarding.....the point is that all this would be unnecessary if T Mobile US offered fair international roaming rates.

But of course people vote with their feet so to speak. As long as people are ignorant of what a rip off T Mo's (and AT&T) international roaming rates are, they will say idiotic things like I don't think 99¢/minute is a bad rate to receive a call on my cell phone in Europe. They just don't get it eh.

I wonder if the bean counters at T Mobile USA have ever really sat down and realized the bonanza they could be missing out on by adjusting roaming rates to what they should be.

[FBlack_111]

Want to hear a huge rip off by T-Mobile? Try making a call from a cruise ship. T-Mobile charges $4.99 a minute. Verizon and Att charge $2.49. This is no bargain either, but a whole lot less than T-Mobile. Don't use your International SIM either on a cruise ship. It costs more than Verizon and ATT, but less than T-Mobile.

[snidely]

Originally Posted by FBlack_111

Want to hear a huge rip off by T-Mobile? Try making a call from a cruise ship. T-Mobile charges $4.99 a minute. Verizon and Att charge $2.49. This is no bargain either, but a whole lot less than T-Mobile. Don't use your International SIM either on a cruise ship. It costs more than Verizon and ATT, but less than T-Mobile.

Hate to sound as an apologist for the cell carriers -but ships use satellites for internet. That is very expensive. The sat. internet providers charge by the mb. I assume that cell phone services on ship connect the same way.
OTH, there is no excuse for T-M to charge double what everyone else charges.

BTW, maybe it would pay to rent a sat. phone. Think calls are $1 to $1.50/min. Don't know what the rental cost would be.

...mike

[DRNewcomb]

Originally Posted by snidely

Hate to sound as an apologist for the cell carriers -but ships use satellites for internet. That is very expensive. The sat. internet providers charge by the mb. I assume that cell phone services on ship connect the same way.

Not all that expensive. Yes, calls via INMARSAT are expensive but the way the cruise ships are set up is that they have a high bandwidth, full-time satellite connection. This serves all their data needs and most of their ship-to-shore communications needs. Most crew-calling shipboard solutions run about $1-$1.50/min. On US Navy ships you will often find a phone for the sailors personal use. They buy prepaid cards in the ships store for about $1/min, as I recall. So, roaming at $2.50/min is expensive. $4.50/min is just obscene. Being charged that price anywhere is obscene. OTOH, receiving a SMS and sending via FishText or smsBug is a good deal. You can stay in touch with home 24/7 for almost nothing.