Travel Technology - The Irksome Cellphone Industry

A great article by NY Times columnist David Pogue:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/23/technology/personaltech/23pogue.html

A true Pogue post. Half the stuff he writes misses the point or is incorrect.

Especially the "double billing" section - that REALLY show he is clueless about the industry. If he really knew what he was talking about, he'd understand how the US and European calling systems differ.

Especially the "double billing" section - that REALLY show he is clueless about the industry. If he really knew what he was talking about, he'd understand how the US and European calling systems differ.
He has a point about the fee for receiving a text message, which I do find odious (though I don't pay it on my old Blue AT&T plan), but I much prefer our system of paying for inbound and outbound minutes over the European model of having to pay extra to call a mobile phone. Those mobile phone calling costs have not decreased the same way landline long distance has, and so the difference between calling a landline and a mobile in Europe has widened.

I lived in countries which have both systems and see the value in both the European model and the U.S. model. I think the real problem is the heavy surcharge that some countries add for calling a mobile. The UK robs people for calling mobiles. Many countries, it is only a cent or two surcharge. For example, in the UAE it costs something like two cents a minute to call a mobile and no one worries about it. I was just in Trinidad and no one worried about it because it was a penny or two extra to call a mobile. Most countries with free incoming have better prepaid deals than the US (France is an exception, their deals stink). The caller paid model creates an incentive for the cell phone industry to allow long shelf lives on mobile.

I think the European model works better for light talkers, but that heavy talkers do better on the US system. Europeans, however, really believe it is a right not to pay for calls when someone calls you. I've watched people go to huge lengths to stop their child, girl friend, etc. who is on temporary assignment in the US to use minutes to receive calls.

The US tried a caller pays model. It was area code 500. Never heard of it, I wonder why.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Area_code_500

Imagine calling someone and hearing a voice over saying "you will be paying $0.18 a minute to speak to this person. The infrastructure is in place for these calls. I just don't think it will sell. Moreover, U.S. Cellular has a free incoming call (non-surcharged), but I don't think it is very popular. If I were a locksmith, plumber, one man cab company, or some other individual who worked out of his car, this might make sense. Rogers in Canada has this as well.

Having said all of this, I am become less and less impressed with David Pogue. The more I read him, the less I think he knows what he is talking about.

He has a point about the fee for receiving a text message, which I do find odious

I do too. I thought I was paying to send but not to receive, and that only Verizon charged for receiving. I'm AT&T. I called AT&T right after I read the article just to be sure. The rep reminded me that I could go to the web site and block numbers if I chose. My reply was that I'd have to receive and pay for at least one message before I knew that I wanted it to be blocked. I think an analogy would be paying to receive junk mail.

Related to the 'In Europe you pay more to call a cell' argument, is it right that with my prepaid Spanish SIM I don't pay for calls to people on the same network? That's what my Spanish friend said and I just took it as gospel. If that's true, then really, it's a huge selling point to be on the same network as all your friends. Hmmm.

Oh, and Stu- I had a 500 number for a while about ten years ago. Most businesses couldn't call it because it was blocked along with sex-line numbers. At the time it was really hard for people to get their head around the idea of a phone number with no fixed location.

Right being a Brit I would be mortified if my mobile phone used some my remaining balance when someone called me. If that was the case I'd just go back to having a landline and ditch the mobile. Actually I have three mobiles one for phone use (Samsung), one for Email ('Berry 8120) and one for Skype the INQ1 on Three, all of them Pay As You Go (or PrePaid).

What is great is that when I need to shout at someone at Target for losing an order I can be on a bus , walking down the street and just because they have a 1-800 number I can call them for nothing on my INQ1 I don't even have to top up/have credit on the phone. I can also call other Three users for free as well, but that requires me to top up at least once every 90 days so roughly four times a year. My £10 top up also gets me 150Mb of data and plugging the phone into a computer allows it to be used as an HSDPA modem so I think it's a good deal.

I don't make masses of calls and I can usually make £20 of credit on my Samsung last several months but if everyone who texted me or called me took a bit of my balance each time that would be gone in no time. What I do find a rip off is my land line which costs £160/year before I've made any calls and I've looked into cancelling that as a result.

Some companies just send out spam texts (although they are trying to crack down these companies) and marketing calls and I think it would be a real liberty if I had to pay to receive those calls. I like to think of the situation in the UK as being like the postal system, If I want to send a letter for I pay for stamps to send it the person at the other end. They haven't asked me to send them this letter and would probably refuse to do so if they were unsure who it was sending it.

Right being a Brit I would be mortified if my mobile phone used some my remaining balance when someone called me. If that was the case I'd just go back to having a landline and ditch the mobile. Actually I have three mobiles one for phone use (Samsung), one for Email ('Berry 8120) and one for Skype the INQ1 on Three, all of them Pay As You Go (or PrePaid).



The upside to the US system is that people have a local number for their phone, and calls to mobiles don't cost anything more than any other local to local call. Unlimited home phone planes thus allow unlimited calls to mobiles.

What are you paying in the UK for calls to mobiles?

He has a point about the fee for receiving a text message, which I do find odious (though I don't pay it on my old Blue AT&T plan), but I much prefer our system of paying for inbound and outbound minutes over the European model of having to pay extra to call a mobile phone.

We have an old Blue plan as well and I am happy with the free incoming texts. However, they do keep raising the rates for the outgoing texts (now 20 cents) and they adamantly refuse to let me add a text plan. I guess they will try hard to make it harder to stay on an old plan... Anyone have luck adding features to a Blue plan?

they adamantly refuse to let me add a text plan. I guess they will try hard to make it harder to stay on an old plan... Anyone have luck adding features to a Blue plan?

You can still add some features to a Blue plan. There are a couple of text features available, I think--one with 200 texts and one with unlimited texts, I believe. You can't add online; you have to call. I guess I'd just call back.

Since I'm on a corporate account IRU (individual responsibility user), I always deal with Business End User Care, which I've found to be infinitely better than the general reps.

You can still add some features to a Blue plan. There are a couple of text features available, I think--one with 200 texts and one with unlimited texts, I believe. You can't add online; you have to call. I guess I'd just call back.

Since I'm on a corporate account IRU (individual responsibility user), I always deal with Business End User Care, which I've found to be infinitely better than the general reps.

I do also get to Business care and I agree it is better. I tried to call last week to add a 200 message plan to my wife's line. They refused, saying the only way to get a text plan was to migrate over to orange.... It seems unfair that they let me keep the plan but can raise text fees as they wish with no recourse on my end. We could cancel (and are well out of contract) but that's probably great for them. And there is no plan anywhere near comparable to what we have for what we pay. On the new plans we'd have to pay for early nights and all texts! What would we gain? Rollover...

Thanks! Might head into a corporate store and try my luck. I just don't want them to screw up and then say my old plan is lost forever. Basically, all I would want is a 200 message plan for my wife's phone. With incoming free, a 200 message plan would be MORE than enough.

fuzz

He's got something of an issue with the contract lock-ins. Yes, the lock-in exists because the contract subsidizes the phone but the real reason is because they don't like customers leaving. Otherwise if you had your own phone you would be able to get a better deal with no lock-in.

Wow, a rep just told me that I can either pay to receive crank text messages, or pay $4.99/month for the ability to filter them. What a racket.

I just added Google Voice to my Blackberry and am using it for most of my text messages. Received messages come in a little slow and the alert doesn't flash the light on my Crackberry. Hopefully with Version 2 and the forthcoming number portability, I can completely ditch my cell phone's text plan.

The upside to the US system is that people have a local number for their phone, and calls to mobiles don't cost anything more than any other local to local call. Unlimited home phone planes thus allow unlimited calls to mobiles.

What are you paying in the UK for calls to mobiles?

Do you know I have no idea, :eek: I think it is around 25p a minute for another network and 5p for my (phone) network from my mobile. But I get free minutes with my topup and I use those first so I don't really find I need to know.

From my landline Standard Mobile rates (daytime) 12.23p/min (evening) 7.34p/min.

Do you know I have no idea, :eek: I think it is around 25p a minute for another network and 5p for my (phone) network from my mobile. But I get free minutes with my topup and I use those first so I don't really find I need to know.

From my landline Standard Mobile rates (daytime) 12.23p/min (evening) 7.34p/min.

And therein lies the big difference in the US - for me, calls to any US number are free (for $9.99/month). It doesn't matter whether I am calling a mobile or land line.

That is why incoming calls come out of my minutes pool (or unlimited in my case). On my mobile, I pay $49.95/month for unlimited minutes and text.

It isn't necessarily cheaper than the UK - but the system of local numbers for mobiles works quite well in my opinion.

And therein lies the big difference in the US - for me, calls to any US number are free (for $9.99/month). It doesn't matter whether I am calling a mobile or land line.

That is why incoming calls come out of my minutes pool (or unlimited in my case). On my mobile, I pay $49.95/month for unlimited minutes and text.

It isn't necessarily cheaper than the UK - but the system of local numbers for mobiles works quite well in my opinion.

Yeah and most people make way more calls than me. There are contracts out there that give you unlimited anynetwork minutes, I just don't want to be tied into a contract - I'm a cheapskate in that respect!

So far on my Skype mobile I've made 70mins of calls to the USA and 20mins to Thailand, and I've only had it two weeks, total cost nothing - I'm a cheapskate in that respect:D!

A true Pogue post. Half the stuff he writes misses the point or is incorrect.

Especially the "double billing" section - that REALLY show he is clueless about the industry. If he really knew what he was talking about, he'd understand how the US and European calling systems differ.

+1

He seems to fail to understand that the monthly charges would be higher if providers were not permitted to nickle-and-dime for texts, etc. just as hotels and airlines do.

And I disagree with the premise - my #1 issue with my service provider (sprint) is unavailability of the phones I want (several years ago it was the Moto razr, and currently the iPhone). Of course, I could simply switch providers, but that would basically double my phone bill for a far worse plan (I currently have 5pm nights and unlimited texts :cool:).

+1

He seems to fail to understand that the monthly charges would be higher if providers were not permitted to nickle-and-dime for texts, etc. just as hotels and airlines do.

And I disagree with the premise - my #1 issue with my service provider (sprint) is unavailability of the phones I want (several years ago it was the Moto razr, and currently the iPhone). Of course, I could simply switch providers, but that would basically double my phone bill for a far worse plan (I currently have 5pm nights and unlimited texts :cool:).
I can't believe that anybody is happy enough with any US mobile provider to say that their no. 1 issue (and no. 2, 3, 4) is anything other than the quality of the network. Phone call quality on US providers is ridiculously bad. Like going back to the dark ages. I've tried AT&T, Verizon, TM, none of them would get more than a 2/10 rating from me. Dropped calls (remember them?), horribly distorted quality, unavailability of channels, data connections so slow they are stopped... I'm amazed the tolerance for this is so high.

Try taking your cheapest AT&T-provided GSM phone, go to a "developed" market like Kuwait, Kazakhstan, Indonesia, etc :) and you would not believe you are using the same phone. The quality difference is unbelievable.

This is the problem to fix - they are certainly making the money to do so!

Don't we trade off per line tax charges for the free calling to any number in the US? (I mean the no-surcharge for calling mobiles, etc, in the US.)

Or did they ever do away with that?

There was a second Pogue blog post today, with references to a strange reply from Verizon, that got printed in edited form in the Letters to the Editor on Sunday. Oh that's odd, I read the post this morning via an RSS feed, and now it's not there.

-David

I agree that the quality of calld outside the US is better. Part of that is due mainly to the size of most of those countries VS the US. It's easy to saturate them with cellular masts.

I agree that the quality of calld outside the US is better. Part of that is due mainly to the size of most of those countries VS the US. It's easy to saturate them with cellular masts.
Well no - that's not the distinguishing factor. The quality is bad in the US in both metro areas and rural areas. In many of the metro areas the infrastructure is so overly contended that the quality is even worse. But there is a "baseline" quality level in the US that is significantly worse than other GSM deployments globally, regardless of the area.

As a comparison - try using a GSM phone in Times Square in NYC and Piccadilly Circus in London - both built up areas, lots of congestion. The call quality in London will be crystal clear, I guarantee it.

I don't think anyone mentioned this advantage of caller-pays for incoming calls to mobiles: You are very unlikely to receive junk calls :D

I don't think anyone mentioned this advantage of caller-pays for incoming calls to mobiles: You are very unlikely to receive junk calls :D
^^