Mobitel, Simobil Expect No Problems with Roaming Fee Caps
Slovenia's biggest mobile operators said they expected no problems with the implementation of an EU regulation that cuts charges for cross-border mobile calls and received the final stamp of approval by the member states on Thursday.
The regulation stipulates that after final enactment of the rules, mobile phone operators will have one month to offer customers a new pricing structure with substantially lower roaming rates.
After another two months, users who have not expressed a preference will be switched to the new tariff, which has been capped at 49 euro cents per minute for making and 24 cents for receiving mobile calls abroad.
Market leader Mobitel said in a statement for STA that it would begin implementing the regulation accordingly.
Similarly, Slovenia's second largest operator Simobil said it would follow the rules accordingly and even try to surpass the provisions by offering customers the best rates for EU and non-EU calls.
Mobitel users are currently paying between 70 cents and 1.38 euros per minute for calls from the neighbouring EU countries of Austria, Italy and Hungary, depending on the subscription plan.
Customers of Simobil, which is part of the Vodafone-owned Telekom Austria group, pay between 70 and 80 cents.
The fees for calls from other EU countries are much higher, however, and reach as high as 2 euros per minute for calls from Lithuania.
Both operators predict that the new rules will not have an impact on revenues, as roaming income represents only a small proportion of total income.
However, an analysis published recently by the business daily Finance suggests that revenues from inter-connection charges and roaming represented as much as 37% of Simobil's total income in 2005, or EUR 17.5m gross operating revenues.
Mobitel earned even more, EUR 23.7m, but this represented less than 17% of gross operating revenues in 2005.
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