Tesco snout in the EU roaming trough

[notya...@gmail.com]

Alas Tesco (clone of O2 and managed by them) is to reintroduce rip off roaming charges from next year.

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/2022/06/tesco-europe-roaming-charges/

Does not auger well for O2 not bringing them back too, as they must be acquiring subscribers who want to roam. Whilst this has no marginal cost for Telephonica on their own extensive networks, but will result in cross charging when subscribers roam onto other networks (e.g. Voda) in the EU..

Brexit - six years on today - all of the pain, none of the gain.

[Pamela]

Presumably UK mobile operators were making money with the previous
tariffs where roaming costs and calls to the EU were cheaper.

Wouldn't new much-increased profit margins be deemed excessive by
Ofcom?

[notya...@gmail.com]

Well indeed. Vodafone, Telephonica and Orange had extensive European networks, so the marginal cost to them was negligible, and they probably had a mutual settlement aggrerement given that on average each would source and receive roughly the same number of calls from other networks.

Today it is possible to call New Zealand for 1p a minute or even less, fifty years ago it was 1.21s for 2p - i.e. £1 per minute (~= £10 today)

[Woody]

Not sure where you got that one Mark. AFAIK Tesco is a MVNO so run there
own operation. If they are resuming charging in the EU it must be of
their own conscious decision.

O2 is now half owned by Liberty Global within the VM family but GiffGaff
is still owned by Telephonica> I have just had a mail from them to say
that from 26th July you data limit in the EU will be 5GB instead of 20GB
from the GoodyBag as is now, BUT AFAICS there is no change to calls or
texts - i.e. unlimited.

[Tweed]

The whole thing is consumer gouging. Let’s be clear, nothing has changed
for the operators at wholesale level. The EU rules only affect what they
can charge the end user. The internal settlement costs between operators
for intra EU roaming have always been at commercially negotiated rates. So
the operator costs have not changed since Brexit. The only thing that has
changed is they are now allowed to gouge the end user. Ofcom could have
imposed a licence condition to require things to remain as they were, but
in their wisdom the government has allowed the operators to rip us off.
Brexit dividend indeed.

[Mark Carver]

On 23/06/2022 17:02, Woody wrote:
> On Thu 23/06/2022 11:14, notya...@gmail.com wrote:
>> Alas Tesco (clone of O2 and managed by them) is to reintroduce rip
>> off roaming charges from next year.
>>
>> https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/2022/06/tesco-europe-roaming-charges/
>>
>>
>> Does not auger well for O2 not bringing them back too, as they must
>> be acquiring subscribers who want to roam.  Whilst this has no
>> marginal cost for Telephonica on their own extensive networks, but
>> will result in cross charging when subscribers roam onto other
>> networks (e.g. Voda) in the EU..
>>
>> Brexit - six years on today - all of the pain, none of the gain.
>

> Not sure where you got that one . AFAIK Tesco is a MVNO so run there

> own operation. If they are resuming charging in the EU it must be of
> their own conscious decision.

Tesco Mobile is a 50/50 joint venture with Tesco and O2/Virgin

[Martin Brown]

On 23/06/2022 17:46, Tweed wrote:
> Woody <harro...@ntlworld.com> wrote:
>> On Thu 23/06/2022 11:14, notya...@gmail.com wrote:
>>> Alas Tesco (clone of O2 and managed by them) is to reintroduce rip off
>>> roaming charges from next year.
>>>
>>> https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/2022/06/tesco-europe-roaming-charges/
>>>
>>> Does not auger well for O2 not bringing them back too, as they must be
>>> acquiring subscribers who want to roam. Whilst this has no marginal
>>> cost for Telephonica on their own extensive networks, but will result in
>>> cross charging when subscribers roam onto other networks (e.g. Voda) in the EU..
>>>
>>> Brexit - six years on today - all of the pain, none of the gain.
>>
>> Not sure where you got that one Mark. AFAIK Tesco is a MVNO so run there
>> own operation. If they are resuming charging in the EU it must be of
>> their own conscious decision.

Brexit has *enabled* them to price gouge.

>> O2 is now half owned by Liberty Global within the VM family but GiffGaff
>> is still owned by Telephonica> I have just had a mail from them to say
>> that from 26th July you data limit in the EU will be 5GB instead of 20GB
>> from the GoodyBag as is now, BUT AFAICS there is no change to calls or
>> texts - i.e. unlimited.
>>
>
> The whole thing is consumer gouging. Let’s be clear, nothing has changed
> for the operators at wholesale level. The EU rules only affect what they
> can charge the end user. The internal settlement costs between operators
> for intra EU roaming have always been at commercially negotiated rates. So

We are now outside the EU so they can now charge what they like.
Take it or leave it. Willing seller willing buyer are both required.

> the operator costs have not changed since Brexit. The only thing that has
> changed is they are now allowed to gouge the end user. Ofcom could have
> imposed a licence condition to require things to remain as they were, but
> in their wisdom the government has allowed the operators to rip us off.
> Brexit dividend indeed.

UK isn't called "the golden island" for nothing. Driving on the left is
another way that we also get monumentally ripped off.
Brexit hasn't actually changed that...

Brexit was *designed* to allow more price gouging by mates of The Boris.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown

[notya...@gmail.com]

On Thursday, 23 June 2022 at 17:02:38 UTC+1, Woody wrote:
> On Thu 23/06/2022 11:14, notya...@gmail.com wrote:
> > Alas Tesco (clone of O2 and managed by them) is to reintroduce rip off roaming charges from next year.
> >
> > https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/2022/06/tesco-europe-roaming-charges/
> >
> > Does not auger well for O2 not bringing them back too, as they must be acquiring subscribers who want to roam. Whilst this has no marginal cost for Telephonica on their own extensive networks, but will result in cross charging when subscribers roam onto other networks (e.g. Voda) in the EU..
> >
> > Brexit - six years on today - all of the pain, none of the gain.
> Not sure where you got that one Mark. AFAIK Tesco is a MVNO so run there
> own operation. If they are resuming charging in the EU it must be of
> their own conscious decision.

I do. When I visited O2's call centre where they run Giff-Gaff and Tesco's operation.

[Chris in Makati]

I assume there must be enough willing buyers out there who are
prepared to pay these roaming charges or they wouldn't be able to get
away with it.

There are plenty of alternative ways to get data and phone calls while
overseas, so the charges are easily circumvented, albeit with some
inconvenience.

I actually moved to a lower tariff on Sky after they reintroduced
roaming. I don't need to pay for as much data from Sky now as I use
other alternatives while overseas. So Sky actually get less revenue
from me now.

[Tweed]

Cartel like behaviour. They’ve set the pricing to make it just tolerable
for those that go away on holiday for a few weeks each year. I’m expecting
O2 to charge soon, just because they can.

[notya...@gmail.com]

If they do it will be proof of failure of the CMA, allowing the 121 - Orange merger and then even worse allowing BT to take it over. Never mind roaming - the cost of a one minute landline to mobile call with BT as about 50p.

[Kevin H]

Son has a Sky mobile (I'm the bill payer as he doesn't have a credit record). They charge £2 per day to use your package abroad which I don't think is unreasonable (setting aside the frustration of increases post Brexit). His friends on a recent holiday to Turkey were all complaining about the costs of roaming and he was amongst the cheapest (data being all they are interested in. Never uses the phone for calls). I'm on an EE sim only contract that was contracted before the date when they re-introduced EU roaming charges, so will be able to enjoy a final European summer holiday with roaming free costs. Sigh.