WELL, THAT WAS predictable.
We awoke Wednesday morning to a new report on wireless – this time on data roaming charges – from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development. The press release bellowed: “More effective competition and better regulation needed to cut high mobile data roaming costs, says OECD”.
When an international body with an unwieldy membership and fuzzy, broad mandate such as the OECD says we need more regulation of this or that, my automatic bullshit antenna engages. I also wondered aloud right away where Canada would rank in the report and in the press release (the only bit of the report most will read). Yup, we look pretty bad.
There’s a chart in the press release showing Canadians pay the most, by far, in data roaming charges. “Canadians travelling abroad pay the most (USD 24.61), followed by Americans (USD 22.06) and Mexicans (USD 19.85). Greeks abroad pay the least (USD 4.17), followed by people from Iceland (USD 4.42) and Luxembourg (USD 4.46),” for 1 MB of data, reads the release.
Uh-oh. Slam dunk story for mainstream media folks. Picking on big telecom companies is just sooo easy. Almost as easy as slamming the CRTC.
The Twitterverse, so sure we’re all getting “gouged”, predictably raced into high gear decrying the state of competition in Canada as the OECD release was re-written by virtually every media outlet across the country saying, in essence: “Canadian wireless companies: BOOO!” The media’s go-to guy for all things digital, University of Ottawa professor Michael Geist was interviewed and blogged about it, and quoted far and wide. I’m pretty sure he’s the only person allowed to be quoted by reporters looking for comment on such matters…
Equally predictably, the Financial Post’s Terence Corcoran took the opposing point of view, stressing that Canada actually has the cheapest data roaming charges when it comes to travelling into the U.S. and Mexico, the places where Canadians visit most often.
Geist and Corcoran even went after each other a bit on Twitter late yesterday over their interpretations of what the OECD reported.
As well and again, predictably, I asked the usual suspects for their feedback and got some predictable answers. My eyes were opened to Wind, however, whose roaming rates, (like this voice roaming magazine ad notes), look pretty darn cheap.
“Wind is doing its part to bring down rates but regulators need to continue to encourage competition including new measures designed to ensure that wholesale domestic and international roaming rates reflect the true wholesale cost of delivery,” said Ed Antecol, vice-president regulatory affairs and carrier services.
“To that end, Canadian regulators ought to follow the EU’s lead and cap domestic wholesale roaming rates.”
I got something new from Telus, though. The company is days away from launching newer, simpler, far-cheaper data roaming plans that will undercut its competition by more than 50%, said vice-president of marketing, Brent Johnston.
“We view ourselves as a relatively new entrant to the international roaming arena,” he noted, pointing out that until Telus and Bell launched their GSM/HSPA network in 2009, if you were a traveller and Canadian, you had a Rogers phone, as they were GSM for years.
With roaming agreements with carriers around the world done – and with consumers complaining that travelling with their wireless handsets is confusing and expensive, Telus will soon unveil “a dramatic simplification and reduction in our international roaming pricing,” explained Johnston.
“You’re going to start to see more competition in this arena and more choice,” he predicted. “Part of our simplification strategy is based on the knowledge that many consumers aren’t always as aware as you might think of all the various packages and passes that are available to them… and as much as you’ll see a dramatic reduction in rates, you’ll see a dramatic simplification for consumers so they have a lot less to worry about.”
As a consumer and a traveler, this sounds good, too. As many others have, I found out how expensive it is to roam beyond our borders on a U.S. business trip years ago when I returned to an $800 wireless bill. So now, before I go anywhere, I pre-purchase a travel plan. Actually, I have to pre-buy three travel plans. One for voice. One for data. One for texts. I have to try and predict how many texts I’ll use, how many MBs I’ll download, and how long I plan to talk.
Every time, it’s a pain in the ass and despite what I’m told, it seems pretty darn expensive to me. Many other customers don’t know that they should do this before travelling in order to cut their costs.
However, I’m now thinking that if my BlackBerry knows I’m no longer in Canada, why can’t my provider figure out I probably DON’T want to pay 15 cents for every text, and $30 per MB for data roaming, and just apply a travel plan automatically?
The wireless providers can send warnings when customers exceed their packages, so we have the technology.
But it’s about time to deploy it so that customers are happier and these predictable consumer relations wildfires sparked when a body in Paris decides to publish a report, don’t spread.
