"It's good to talk" was for years the catchphrase of British Telecom. Now Viviane Reding, European Commissioner for Media and Information Society, seems to be making it her own in the ongoing struggle to cut excessive roaming charges.

She is backed up in this by a Eurobarometer survey, published this month. The latest poll details how almost 80% of Europeans own a mobile phone, and that nine out of ten us use 'international roaming services' when travelling abroad.

A vast majority of us prefer not to buy a new sim card when visiting foreign countries and instead limit our calls to limit our costs. Indeed over 80% of us say this is the main reason why we use our mobiles less when we're abroad.

Close on 60% would talk for longer if foreign tariffs were cut, while over two-thirds would back EU intervention to cut roaming charges for calls and SMS. So a majority of Europeans say the EU should step in to guarantee charges abroad are not substantially higher than at home.

According to Commission figures released early November, mobile phone users in Europe pay between €4 and €6 for a four minute 'roaming' call abroad. In some cases, roaming prices for such calls can exceed €12.

"Excessively high prices restrict mobile usage while abroad. This hurts consumers, it hurts European industry, and it hurts Europe," declared Viviane Reding.

"Reducing roaming prices is not only a political responsibility of the European Commission, but can also be an interesting business model, as demonstrated by some operators who have started to move in this direction in recent months with the introduction of special roaming packages…"

Reding added that it is simply "not acceptable that the burden of international mobile roaming continues to be shouldered by ordinary citizens".

Howard Hudson,
24 November 2006