Advice for calling US Mobile Phone?

Thus spaketh Joseph:
> On Tue, 24 May 2005 23:43:01 +0100, "{{{{{Welcome}}}}}"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Thus spaketh Joseph:
>>> On Tue, 24 May 2005 20:49:06 +0100, "{{{{{Welcome}}}}}"
>>> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>
>>>> No point in keep arguing, as said before changing to the poorer USA
>>>> system is unlikely.
>>>
>>> And you lied! You said no point in arguing but you come right out
>>> and say that the USA system is poorer. You have made the decision
>>> for everyone haven't you?! Somehow you think you have "won" the
>>> argument when in fact you haven't done any such thing! They are
>>> different systems and likely will remain so. Why you feel you need
>>> to put in your feelings of your system's superiority is quite
>>> beyond me.
>>>
>>> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
>>
>> There are no winners or losers to the argument. I think the USA
>> system is crazy, the odd few think it is a good idea. Arguing ain't
>> going to change it anytime soon.
>
> Then why the hell do you do it?! You continue to claim that your
> system is better and then say "arguing ain't going to change it."
> Don't speak out of both sides of your mouth.
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Isn't that the point of having a mouth, be pretty stupid to only talk out of
one half!


Makes you wonder how the USA got to the moon, or out of the studio.


If English isn't your first language, then I can forgive you for finding
English difficult to comprehend.

I believe our system is better, and you believe your system is better. I am
not going to change your mind, and you ain't going to change my mind on the
matter.

So there is little point arguing on that matter, as I can't see either the USA
or Europe changing the system they have in place, but that doesn't mean I
can't voice my opinion on the matter.

---

› See More: Advice for calling US Mobile Phone?

Thus spaketh Joseph:
> On Wed, 25 May 2005 01:24:17 +0100, "{{{{{Welcome}}}}}"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> I just
>> don't want the USA system to be compulsory.
>
> It won't be and things will likely remain the way they are. Why you
> are whipping yourself into a frenzy over the issue of different
> charging methods mystifies me. They are not going to change.
>
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I am not.

Thus spaketh Joseph:
> On Tue, 24 May 2005 23:44:39 +0100, "{{{{{Welcome}}}}}"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> And I can't see why anyone would want to favour the USA system.
>
> Well, that's *you*! You really are a broken record.
>
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

And you're a prick, but you probably can't change that.

Stuart Friedman <[email protected]> wrote:
> The problem in my mind with caller pays is that it switches around the
> economic model. The caller is in a very difficult position to negotiate
> for a cheap termination rate with the mobile provider in exchange for
> guaranteeing the use of a largish block of minutes, e.g. I cannot call
> Voda and say that I plan on spending a thousand minutes a month calling
> Voda customers, what is the best rate you'll give me.
>
> As a result, the cost of terminating calls to mobiles is significantly
> higher than it should be. If the price of calling a mobile was only a few
> cents higher than calling a landline, caller pays would be great.

You make an excellent point here. Overall, the total amount charged to all
people involved in a call (caller and receiver) is generally much higher in
Europe, and the fact that the people paying have almost no leverage in
Europe is surely a major contributor to this situation.

The contorted arguments in defense of this state of affairs remind me of a
thread in rec.travel.europe a few years ago where a bunch of Europeans
yelled themselves hoarse in defense of paying per minute for local calls. As
far as I could tell, the fundamental argument was, "okay, fine, we give
buckets more money to the phone company than they do for the same service,
but we're used to it and they are stupid Americans, so our system is
better."

Now someone figure out how Singapore manages to have caller-pays phones but
still keeps termination charges about the same as those for landlines.

miguel
--
Hit The Road! Photos from 36 countries on 5 continents: http://travel.u.nu
Latest photos: Queens Day in Amsterdam; the Grand Canyon; Amman, Jordan

In message <[email protected]> Joseph
<[email protected]> wrote:

>On Wed, 25 May 2005 01:13:02 +0100, "Andy Pandy"
><[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>If I call a UK Vodafone number when the user is roaming in Germany, I'm already
>>paying a large termination fee to Vodafone. It should cost them a trivial amount
>>to send the call to Vodafone Germany who will terminate the call which I've
>>already paid for.
>
>But assuming Vodafone Germany has caller pays the termination must be
>paid to the Voda network in Germany. Just because you've paid the
>termination charge once why do you think you'd be let off the hook for
>termination charges in another country? Right now any time I call a
>country with caller pays mobile I pay a premium which is up to five
>times the rate for regular fixed wireline phones.

There doesn't need to be any termination charge for a call to be passed
from within one carrier's network to another.

It's essentially free on a per-call basis (Although they are still
installation and maintenance costs to maintain the lines between the
countries -- But this can be absorbed by the company as a cost of doing
business or it can be billed on a per-call basis, it depends on the
company)


--
Eat right, exercise, die anyway.

Phil Thompson <[email protected]> wrote:
> "Steven M. Scharf" <[email protected]> wrote:
>> I don't claim that the U.S. system is necessarily the best, but no one has
>> put forth any coherent argument as to why a caller should have to pay extra
>> to call a mobile phone.
>
> to have the convenience of being able to call the called party
> irrespective of their location ?
>
> It is often more of a benefit to the caller to find the called person,
> than it is for the called person to be found IME.

Nevertheless it was the choice of the phone owner to carry the phone.

It may be more convenient for you to visit me if I live in an apartment in
the city centre, but that doesn't mean you're going to pay my rent.

miguel
--
Hit The Road! Photos from 36 countries on 5 continents: http://travel.u.nu
Latest photos: Queens Day in Amsterdam; the Grand Canyon; Amman, Jordan

Points to be made about the U.S. mobile-pays system are:

1) Many (most?) post-pay plans have unlimited free airtime with free
domestic long distance on all calls placed or received during "off-peak"
(varies, often 9PM-6AM, depends on the provider), and all day Saturday
and Sunday.

2) Likewise, calls to/from other subscribers to the same provider are
often unlimited and free at all times on many post-pay plans.

3) The caller-pays system tends to gouge the caller, who is not
necessarily the mobile provider's customer; they can charge the caller
whatever they want, and their customer, the mobile user being called,
couldn't care less. The mobile-pays system takes minutes out of an
airtime bucket in which the per-minute cost decreases as the bucket size
is increased. I can see why providers like the caller-pays system!

I don't think it is crazy to not want to pay extra to call a wireless
phone. If some one wants to have a mobile phone, then they should pay
for it's use. If someone in europe wants me to call them, they better
give me their land line number.

If the called person finds no benefit in being called, then why does he
have a wireless phone, or have it on when he is not making a call? If
he has it on, he wants to be reachable. If he wants to be reachable,
then he should pay for it.

On Wed, 25 May 2005 00:04:34 -0500, [email protected] (Miguel Cruz)
wrote:

>It may be more convenient for you to visit me if I live in an apartment in
>the city centre, but that doesn't mean you're going to pay my rent.

it would be less convenient, and I would have to pay the extra costs
of getting there. You aren't going to pay my transport costs so that's
a "caller pays" system.

Phil
--
spamcop.net address commissioned 18/06/04
Come on down !

In message of Wed, 25 May 2005, Stuart Friedman writes
>I'm paying US$90 a month for 2,500 prime time minutes. That includes
>incoming and outgoing calls. Calls made before 7am or after 7pm are
>free, as are calls to other subscribers on the ATT/Cingular network.

--
A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
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A: Top-posting.
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In message of Wed, 25 May 2005, {{{{{Welcome}}}}} writes
>Thus spaketh Joseph:
>> On Tue, 24 May 2005 23:43:01 +0100, "{{{{{Welcome}}}}}"
>> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> Thus spaketh Joseph:
>>>> On Tue, 24 May 2005 20:49:06 +0100, "{{{{{Welcome}}}}}"
>>>> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> No point in keep arguing, as said before changing to the poorer USA
>>>>> system is unlikely.
>>>>
>>>> And you lied! You said no point in arguing but you come right out
>>>> and say that the USA system is poorer. You have made the decision
>>>> for everyone haven't you?! Somehow you think you have "won" the
>>>> argument when in fact you haven't done any such thing! They are
>>>> different systems and likely will remain so. Why you feel you need
>>>> to put in your feelings of your system's superiority is quite
>>>> beyond me.
>>>>
>>>> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
>>>
>>> There are no winners or losers to the argument. I think the USA
>>> system is crazy, the odd few think it is a good idea. Arguing ain't
>>> going to change it anytime soon.
>>
>> Then why the hell do you do it?! You continue to claim that your
>> system is better and then say "arguing ain't going to change it."
>> Don't speak out of both sides of your mouth.
>> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
>
>Isn't that the point of having a mouth, be pretty stupid to only talk out of
>one half!
>
>
>Makes you wonder how the USA got to the moon, or out of the studio.
>
>
>If English isn't your first language, then I can forgive you for finding
>English difficult to comprehend.
>
>I believe our system is better, and you believe your system is better. I am
>not going to change your mind, and you ain't going to change my mind on the
>matter.
>
>So there is little point arguing on that matter, as I can't see either the USA
>or Europe changing the system they have in place, but that doesn't mean I
>can't voice my opinion on the matter.
>
>

Here,here
DF

In article <[email protected]>,
[email protected] says...
> Of course they do. They can choose not to answer the call. Caller ID is
> standard, and the phone displays who is calling if the name is in your
> phone's phonebook.

If you choose not to answer, it usually goes to voicemail, and you
pay for that anyway. And if the name's not in your phonebook, you
either take the call or take the chance of missing a call you want to
get - which is kind of a major point of having a mobile phone for me
in the first place.

--
Hedgehog

In article <[email protected]>, [email protected]
says...
> This idea is only good if you are happy to waste £25+ a month on a contract
> phone, that you don't really need, when you can spend a few pennies a month on
> a PAYG phone, that doesn't cost you any thing to receive calls.

Does anyone have stats for what proportion of the population have
mobile phones in the UK compared to North America?

It seemed to me that last time I lived in the latter (until about 1.5
years ago), more people (proportionally) had mobiles here in the UK.
I'm sure that the possibility of being contact-able, without having
to pay for a contract, is the major reason for that. Certainly I
wouldn't have had a mobile phone when I first did if I'd had to sign
up to a contract. I used a PAYG for about four years before getting a
contract, and if I couldn't get a "free" contract (via cashback deal)
I would go back to PAYG now. For me - and I'm sure I'm not alone in
this - being available for people to contact is more important than
being able to make calls when I'm out. It's rare that I need to make
a call that can't wait a couple of hours until I'm next to a
landline, but I find it reassuring that I can be contacted in an
emergency at any time (I have elderly family members and four
children).

--
Hedgehog

In article <[email protected]>, [email protected]lid
says...
> I have a contract anyway, the money isn't wasted for me. So why can't I
> choose to use my inclusive minutes for receiving calls..?

Would it be possible for you to forward your landline number to your
mobile? (I don't know, I'm just wondering if it's something that's
possible and might work for your situation.)

--
Hedgehog