Kroes urges MEPs to back end to mobile roaming charges in pre-election telecoms reform package

Neelie Kroes, the Commissioner responsible for implementing the EU's Digital Agenda, called on MEPs to get behind efforts to "end mobile roaming costs".

"I want us to show citizens that the EU is relevant to their lives," Kroes said in a speech at the European Parliament  last week. "That we made the digital rules catch up with their legitimate expectations.  I want you to be able to go back to your constituents and say that you were able to end mobile roaming costs.  I want you to be able to say that you saved their right to access the open internet, by guaranteeing net neutrality.  I want you to be able to say we took real action on cybercrime and other threats."

"I want to channel your knowledge and passion into the legislation needed to deliver a real single market.  It is my belief that we can deliver such a package - this full, final, package – around Easter 2014," she added.

Mobile network operators (MNOs) can currently charge consumers extra fees when those individuals access voice or data services abroad. Domestic MNOs face charges imposed by foreign operators to terminate connections on their networks so EU legislation currently allows MNOs to recoup money from consumers for doing so.

However, existing EU regulations place limitations on the amount MNOs can charge consumers for roaming. The 2012 Roaming Regulation updated the original Roaming Regulation, which introduced a cap on the roaming fees that can be charged by an MNO to a consumer, as well as a cap on wholesale roaming charges.

Earlier this year the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications (BEREC), which includes representatives of the national regulatory authorities, published guidelines for MNOs on how to interpret the 2012 Roaming Regulation. 

Now Kroes is seeking to prevent consumers from being charged for roaming when abroad within the EU.

"There is no other sector of our incomplete European single market where the barriers are so unneeded, and yet so high," the Commissioner said. "The time for change is now."

Kroes said that a "radical legislative compromise" is required to avert an "economic disaster" and to account for the fact that "everyone will have to give, in order to get".

The European Commission has long sought to establish a pan-EU telecoms market in order to increase cross-border competition between MNOs and drive down costs for consumers. However, telecoms law experts Jon Fell, Florian Von Baum and Emmanuel Gougé of Pinsent Masons, the law firm behind Out-Law.com, previously explained why such a market has never fully materialised. 

They said MNOs are often put off from operating outside of national borders because of the differing regulatory regimes that are in place across the EU. The MNOs want a more harmonised framework and also want restrictions on network infrastructure sharing relaxed so that they can access rivals' existing networks to provide competing services and not face the cost of installing their own infrastructure, the experts said.

In addition, the operators also want competition rules relaxed so as to better enable them to takeover smaller operators based abroad, they added.