Terminate the rate

[m419]

Fed up of paying to much to call mobiles phones from landlines or fed up of paying up to 40 or even 50p per minute to call someone on another mobile network?

If so, then sign the petition led by 3 and BT as well as a few other organisations.

www.terminatetherate.org

3 has planned that if termination rates where scrapped,then they could offer tariffs that could offer unlimited calls to landlines and any UK mobile phones for around £35 per minute to begin.

The funny thing about this though, wasn't it BT that introduced them in the first place??? Since BT and Vodafone where the first to launch wireless/mobile phone services in the UK with Cellnet and Vodafone?

And isn't it 3 that charges the highest termination rates out of all the UK networks?

I suppose they will all have to scrap the charges at the same time in order for it to work.

And what a rip off during 1999/2000, Orange at one point was part of the Vodafone group,so Vodafone was charging premium rates for calling a mobile on another network which was part of the same company.

And BT charging the full landline-to-mobile rate for calling Cellnet and Genie mobiles between 1999 and 2001. Even though they where all in house. Cellnet and Genie before 1999 was a joint venture between BT and Securicor.

Same with Mercury/Cable and Wireless. Between 1993 and 1999 One2one was partly owned by Cable and Wireless and one of Telewest's major shareholders US West now Qwest. The cost of calling one2one phones during this time from Cable and Mercury lines costed up to 30p per minute.

Nevertheless it will be great to see these costs go!

[dragon]

3 has planned that if termination rates where scrapped,then they could offer tariffs that could offer unlimited calls to landlines and any UK mobile phones for around £35 per minute to begin.


I'm guessing that's £35 per month and not £35 per minute as that would be a call I certainly wouldn't like to get the bill for otherwise :Yikes:

[AndyCambs]

I don't think Orange has EVER been part of the Vodafone group. It's been Hutchinson Whampoa at one time, then independent, then part of France Telecom I believe.

Bear in mind the companies are operating as businesses, and so if they remove one charge, then you'll find another will replace it somewhere.

[m419]

Sorry I meant £35 per month LOL

Orange was sold to Mannesman in late 1999 and Mannesman then became part of Vodafone, meaning it was all one group, European goverments would not issue Vodafone 3G licences until they sold off Orange due to competition reasons,however, they were wrong to do this as now we have crap 3G coverage!

France Telecom took over ownership round late 2000/2001.

Hutchison Whampoa continued to use the Orange brand in Austrailia,India,Israel,Hong Kong and a few other places. They leased this from France Telecom, When Hutchison Whampoa launched 3 and migrated all the customers over to it, they quit the Orange brands country by country. Orange India became 'Hutch' and has since been rebranded to Vodafone since Vodafone acquired Hutchison Whampoa's share in the company. The other shareholder is the Indian goverment. In India, companies owned by foreign shareholders are required by law to allow the indian goverment to be a shareholder, as these large companies like Vodafone,Mcdonalds,Hutchison,Coca-cola and Sony are milking developing countries.

France Telecom closed down Hutchison Paging in early 2001.

Hutchison Whampoa currently own A.S Watson retail group who own Superdrug and Savers.

[m419]

This is an attempt to force out Deutsche Telekom (T-Mobile UK) out of the UK telecoms market. T-Mobile has already seen a huge loss in revenue, when 3 launched in the UK,T-Mobile lost a lot of custom to it, T-Mobile also lossed many pay as you go customers when O2 launched unlimited text bolt ons and when vodafone launched schemes such as stop the clock.

BT has had many disputes with T-Mobile over the last few years,most of which were in fact to do with termination rates. BT also discontinued using T-Mobile's network for BT Mobile and wirefree services. T-Mobile also had problems with BT over termination rates and about the rates BT wholesale charges T-Mobile for connecting with other networks,one of which was a voip mobile service called Mobiboo, this resulted in T-Mobile blocking calls to numbers begining 07911. You will also notice that many 118 numbers cannot be accessed from T-Mobile's network.

3 want a bigger market share, and Hutchison see T-Mobile as the weakest link as they are the smallest out of the big 4 (O2,Vodafone,Orange and T-Mobile).

T-Mobile will probably find it difficult to reach break even if termination rates where dropped or scrapped and 3 has seen this as a good shortcut to squeezing them out so it can get a bigger market share and maybe take over T-Mobile's UK operations.

T-Mobile depends on termination rates especially when it comes to Virgin Mobile, Virgin Media has reduced the cost of using T-Mobile's network and termination rates is the main income for virtual mobile network side of T-Mobile's business.

Vodafone is also planning to get its hands on T-Mobile UK, this is likely to fail due to competition issues, however in Austrailia, Hutchison and Vodafone have teamed up and Vodafone Austrailia and 3 Austrailia are 50/50 joint ventures between Hutchison and Vodafone even though they trade under there own brand names. If this was to happen to 3 and Vodafone in the UK, it could mean that Vodafone,3 and T-Mobile be one company. However, 3 and Vodafone would retain there brands.

BT and 3 will get there own way and by maybe 2010, you'll see cheaper calls and improved 3G coverage.

Why else would 3 want to get rid of termination rates when they charge the highest rates out of all of the UK mainland networks???

[AndyCambs]

Also - if termination rates are dropped (which provide the majority of the income for the phone companies) don't you think they will restructure the charges so that you'll pay more another way?
I know that some overseas phone companies charge to receive SMS as an example.

[m419]

No they will never charge for incomming calls and texts in the UK, that will damage the whole structure of the telecoms industry. It will slow down usage.

Its just tough luck! Companies that can't run there businesses properly shouldn't be given special treatment or handouts when there business is going down the pan.

T-Mobile thought they were being clever by acquiring 100% ownership of One2One(Mercury Personal Communications) in 1999, the UK's smallest but quite unreliable when it comes to network coverage and new technology such as GPRS. They had to invest a lot of money on the network up until now, Virgin Mobile is paying them peanuts to use there network because T-Mobile didn't obviously do the paperwork properly and the consequences where that they became expensive,they then lost many customers to 3 especially when 3 launched its Pay As You Go service, in 2006, T-Mobile tried to relaunch its Pay As You Go service by launching 3 additional tariffs. T-Mobile does not offer pay as you go customers unlimited texts and features like that which is what people want but what O2 and 3 offer.

Another thing is, T-Mobile only rolled out GPRS during 2004 which I think shocking to say that it is supposed to be a major network, Vodafone launched GPRS in 1999!