UK: the cost of texting from abroad could drop
By Ben Robinson on Wednesday, January 30th, 2008 at 7:29 PM PST In Services
BBC’s Radio One Newsbeat is reporting that the cost of texting from abroad could be set to drop (grrrrrrrreat!). After roaming calls were addressed last year, Ofcom is now demanding that the cost of texting and using the mobile internet is also reduced.
Apparently the average cost of sending a text in the UK is 5.6p, whereas it’s 21p when roaming – nearly 4x the cost, for something which doesn’t cost the mobile companies much more (yes, there’s some transiting and interworking, but what’s a bit of that between friends!!).Likewise data usage is on a similar multiplier (on average) if you are roaming (except with 3 in some of it’s network countries, which are not charging extra).
Personally I’ll be glad to see this come in – I travel a lot, both Pan-European and Globally, and my phone bill always shocks me – especially when I’ve been travelling a lot during a given month! I don’t think anyone generally would refuse a reduction in prices, so you are all going to agree when you leave comments, right? 
[Via: Story - BBC Radio 1 Newsbeat]
This won’t accomplish any diminish in bills in the long run. We’ve seen this when it was legislated that carriers charge per second. All they did was increase the connection charges.
These heavy-handed regulations will also keep new comers out of the market. If the average customer wants lower prices, it is competition that will legitimately lower bills. This will instead cause an oligopoly; less competition and higher prices for everything.
To those that think you can pass a law that will lower prices, you need to understand opportunity costs in economic terms to understand what will be the long term effect. Less profit will incline these companies to shelve expanding their networks and thus run up costs, legitimately. Capital is always directed into what is seen as the most profitable enterprise.