European deregulation

[sec]

Hi - Just received a message requesting me to complain to EC

to: sg-web-president@ec.europa.eu

cc to: cab-archive-barrot@ec.europa.eu; cab-figel@ec.europa.eu; cab-grybauskaite-commissaire@ec.europa.eu; cab-kallas-web-feedback@ec.europa.eu; cab-orban-contact@ec.europa.eu; cab-piebalgs-archives@ec.europa.eu; cab-rehn-web-feedback@ec.europa.eu; cabinet-borg@ec.europa.eu; cabinet-huebner@ec.europa.eu; charlie.mc-creevy@ec.europa.eu; eliana.garces-tolon@ec.europa.eu; franco.frattini@ec.europa.eu; gerassimos.thomas@ec.europa.eu; guenter.verheugen@ec.europa.eu; janez.potocnik@ec.europa.eu;

Re: Market 15 (mobile access and origination)

Dear President Barroso, dear Commissioners Reding and Kroes, dear members of the European Commission,
I hereby express my disapproval and concern for your envisaged intention to eliminate Market 15 (mobile and access origination) from the list of regulated telecommunications markets. Such decision would be against my interests as a European Citizen and consumer as it would irreversibly affect the level of competition in the mobile market.

On the contrary, I believe that market 15 should be kept in the list of regulated markets and that any step should be taken to ensure that the mobile market remain as competitive as possible.

Access of competitors to mobile networks should not be left to the discretion of few dominant Mobile Operators, but be mandated through regulation for the benefit of consumers and in the interest of a healthy and competitive development of convergent services.

Kind regards

[your name]

The accompanying email was the following (in Italian - but it mainly explains the content of the English message above - except that it adds that the decision would be taken to settle a dispute between two EC commissioners, Reding and Kroes):

Appello urgente ai consumatori utenti di telefonia mobile

La Commissione Europea vuole eliminare la regolamentazione di buona parte della telefonia mobile, con un prevedibile risultato: costi più alti per il consumatore ed un minore livello di concorrenza per le imprese che operano sul mercato.

Nelle prossime ore il Presidente Barroso potrebbe decidere di cancellare l’obbligo di regolamentazione dell’accesso alle reti mobili, per mettere pace tra le due supercommissarie europee, Viviane Reding e Neelie Kroes, in tutti i Paesi europei.

E’ un fatto drammatico che diminuirebbe la già scarsa possibilità di fare concorrenza nel settore e lascerebbe ai pochi operatori mobili già esistenti il potere di stabilire il costo che gli altri operatori nuovi entranti devono pagare loro, se vogliono accedere alla loro rete.

Questo pedaggio sarebbe dunque messo fuori ogni controllo e conseguentemente porterebbe a prezzi più alti per i cittadini, che già spendono tariffe tra le più alte del mondo per questo tipo di servizio.

Siamo ancora in tempo per manifestare tutta la nostra disapprovazione direttamente al Presidente Barroso e a tutti gli altri membri della Commissione.

Alcuni commissari ritengono che sia una scelta sbagliata e una protesta dei consumatori potrebbe aiutarli a spostare l’ago della bilancia.

Un’azione di protesta massiccia servirà a ricordare alle persone che siedono a Bruxelles che i cittadini vogliono maggiore - e non minore - concorrenza nel settore della telefonia mobile e che non devono venir prese decisioni contro gli interessi dei consumatori.

Ti invitiamo a partecipare, apportando il tuo personale contributo.

Se ritieni rilevante questa azione, invia una mail seguendo le indicazioni sotto riportate:

[see quote above]

ATTENZIONE: inoltra questa email oggi stesso al maggior numero di tuoi conoscenti, perché anch'essi scrivano ai rappresentanti di Bruxelles.

More info in Italian are available on
http://www.key4biz.it/News/2007/11/1...Bruxelles.html

I am sending this post even before having made up my own mind - as a first reaction I would say that what it is probably correct that by deregulating the market, larger operators may be the ones that decide who can stay on the market and who cannot (I wonder: could this, for instance, be the end for international sim cards?).

[snaimon]

1. I have no authoruty to speak for you EU folks.
2. I am relatively new to cell phones in US.

=====================================

How about listing PROs and CONs? Here are some possible points.

Cons:

1. Language barriers (although this could be overcome with language options on customer service menus)

2. Who likes change? NOBODY.

3. Consolidation may LESSEN competition and increase prices (small guys lose out).

4. What happens to MVNOs?

5. Will cause turmoil in market.




PRO:

1. Roaming MAY become cheaper (voice, data, SMS).

=====================

Don't claim these are either CORRECT or ALL-inclusive. PLEASE add or correct.

Stan

========================================

[Przemolog]

Originally Posted by sec

I am sending this post even before having made up my own mind - as a first reaction I would say that what it is probably correct that by deregulating the market, larger operators may be the ones that decide who can stay on the market and who cannot (I wonder: could this, for instance, be the end for international sim cards?).

What do you mean by "larger operators"? "Multinational" ones like Voda, T-Mo, Orange or O2?
After all, they could "block" international sim cards even now but it's a niche market after all - no real danger to them . Moreover, international sim cards except for Travelsim and the latest UK products like Xfone or VoiceSIM are basically non-EU ones...

[Przemolog]

Originally Posted by snaimon

Cons:

1. Language barriers (although this could be overcome with language options on customer service menus)

That's so obvious that I'm surprised you even thought about language issues.

Originally Posted by snaimon

2. Who likes change? NOBODY.

Define "change". E.g. I liked very much when mobile operators in my country changed debiting to 1/1 seconds .

Originally Posted by snaimon

1. Roaming MAY become cheaper (voice, data, SMS).

Why - since you have just said that prices may increase? Because cross-border roaming connections will become on-net connections?

[andy]

I think the real struggle is whether there will be a new pan-European regulator or not. Unsurprisingly, the national ones don't want it to happen, and want to keep the ERG instead.

[snaimon]

Originally Posted by Przemolog

That's so obvious that I'm surprised you even thought about language issues.

Define "change". E.g. I liked very much when mobile operators in my country changed debiting to 1/1 seconds .

Why - since you have just said that prices may increase? Because cross-border roaming connections will become on-net connections?

As to language:

FACT 1: options are NOT YET IMPLEMENTED.
FACT 2. how will YOU feel if a pan-EU carrier DOES NOT OFFER Polish as an option?

As to change:

FACT 1: most people RESIST changes BY NATURE - who LIKES the untested, unknown?

As to price changes - you are correct. One can only speculate as to which way they would fall.

FURTHERMORE, I am not sure the North American market is a good example of what will happen after a consolidation. Most of US was and is on POST-PAY. I believe, but may be wrong, that most of EU is on PRE-PAY.

I would tend to agree with Andy..... the citizens' interests are not supreme here but rather the existing national regulators and companies. US customers were never asked if they wanted their Voicestream service to transfer to T-MO. Of course, if they did not like the deal T-MO gave them, they bailded out.

Seems to me the chances of a pan-EU solution are very slim at this time.

As noted, I may be wrong in every point. But you EU folks might want to debate it.

Stan

[Przemolog]

Originally Posted by snaimon

As to language:

FACT 1: options are NOT YET IMPLEMENTED.
FACT 2. how will YOU feel if a pan-EU carrier DOES NOT OFFER Polish as an option?

1. What options and where not implemented? I don't understand what you really mean....
2. Theoretically I would feel bad but it simply won't happen. Any telecom company which won't provide necessary Polish language support, will not make money here. It might be a niche offer at most.

Originally Posted by snaimon

As to change:

FACT 1: most people RESIST changes BY NATURE - who LIKES the untested, unknown?

It's about psychology/sociology - I have no knowledge to discuss this issue honestly.

Happily, despite the fear of changes, tight now we exchange our opinions over relatively quite new Internet instead of well known and tested smoke signs

[sec]

Originally Posted by Przemolog

What do you mean by "larger operators"? "Multinational" ones like Voda, T-Mo, Orange or O2?

Yes, I (or rather, the authors of the petition) definetely meant Vodafone etc.

It is true that international cards are still a niche and mostly non EU based (correct - as I said I hadn't thought about the implications yet). I would add that interconnection fees are mainly an issue for minor national operators. For MVNOs, as far as I know, in Italy the fees are freely negotiated between incumbent operator and virtual operator - so no competition issue involved there.

I guess that should the elimination be made, there might in the long term be a reduction of mobile operators in EU countries (from the current 3/4) - and for sure some serious difficulties for newcomers (maybe even VOIP companies?) - but these are just wild guesses.

[andy]

Originally Posted by andy

I think the real struggle is whether there will be a new pan-European regulator or not. Unsurprisingly, the national ones don't want it to happen, and want to keep the ERG instead.

They've press released their letter to the Commissioner Viviane Reding

http://erg.ec.europa.eu/doc/publicat...ing_letter.pdf

[snaimon]

Originally Posted by Przemolog

1. What options and where not implemented? I don't understand what you really mean....
2. Theoretically I would feel bad but it simply won't happen. Any telecom company which won't provide necessary Polish language support, will not make money here. It might be a niche offer at most.

What I mean is....

1. Let's say the telcom scene in EU changes to the following:

4-6 big multi-nationals that have bought up/merged with MOST current national carriers. Voda, T-MO, O2 come to mind as pan_EU companies, but maybe others will come together. So, if you are a T-MO UK customer, you become a T-MO EU customer, etc. Instead of a NATIONAL customer care for UK, DE, etc., there is one consolidated customer care # for all T-MO EU customers. (A separate "Vociestream" USA customer care disappeared when it was bought up by T-MO). TRUE, a T-MO EU (or other biggie) may decide to leave customer care as a national entity tied to the old carrier. I would THINK that rationalization (cost-cutting) might play a role, however.

CURRENTLY, when you call T-MO DE customer care, you have to speak German and only German (at least when I was, there was no choice for English or other language on a menu -- TRUE, you could try your English or whatever with the person from T-MO, but a language selection menu was not implemented). I would EXPECT the same holds for T-MO UK except the language would be English, of course. And so on for each country where there is/was a national operator.

So, in the future, T-MO EU would have to implement a customer care system that would allow users to select the language they would wish to use with customer care. THAT system is not implemented because there is no T-MO EU of VODA-EU.

Can you envision a time when, say T-MO EU decides NOT to support every single European language, especially if its say Slovak-speaking customer base falls below a given #? They may have supported Slovak to start, but over time, the Slovak-speaking customers migrated to another carrier.

2. Brings us to 2. If all your national carriers on PL are "merged" into the biggies, you may not have a choice if or when one or more of those biggies decides to drop support for a given language. Not saying that will ever happen, but it might.

Stan