Europe’s mobile phone companies are braced for a clash with EU regulators this week as telecoms commissioner Viviane Reding calls for the cost of sending texts when abroad to be more than halved.
The EU is also set to announce a clampdown on mobile ringtone services that offer “free” downloads to snare teenagers into signing expensive monthly contracts.
The EU’s consumer protection chief Meglena Kuneva has looked at more than 500 such services across the EU as part of an investigation into possible breaches of consumer protection legislation. She is understood to want national regulators to take legal action against ringtone providers who do not make it plain to consumers that they are signing up for a paid subscription service. She wants anyone selling subscription services — which cost consumers several dollars a day —- to be barred from using the term “free” on promotional texts and advertisements.
The Office of Fair Trading and the UK’s premium-rate content regulator, PhonepayPlus, have been involved in the inquiry and on Thursday — the same day as Kuneva’s announcement — PhonepayPlus will unveil its proposals for a wide-ranging shake-up of an industry that across Europe is worth more than 500 million euros (US$793 million) a year. PhonepayPlus recently said it has seen complaints about such services double over the first three months of this year.
The hidden charges behind ringtones hit the headlines in the UK three years ago when parents complained that their children had unknowingly signed up for subscription services when they downloaded the popular Crazy Frog ringtone.
PhonepayPlus’s new proposals, however, include not just ringtones but cover the advertising and promotion of other forms of mobile content such as games and are designed to make it very clear to consumers what they are paying and what they will get when they sign up.
Reding, meanwhile, has become increasingly annoyed with the mobile phone industry’s failure to reduce the cost of using a mobile phone overseas. She has already clamped down on the cost of making calls abroad and will now set her sights on text roaming prices.
The commission reckons that the average consumer is charged about 0.30 euros to send a text from abroad and Reding wants that slashed to 0.12 euros. She will also call for reductions in the cost of using the Internet abroad through a mobile phone termed “data roaming.” Data roaming has become a particularly contentious subject recently because of the introduction of the iPhone.
The average cost of downloading 1MB of data in the EU is 5.24 euros. The commission reportedly wants the price that the mobile phone companies charge each other — known as the wholesale price — for that amount of data to be slashed to 0.35 euros.
MORE VISITORS: The Tourism Administration said that it is seeing positive prospects in its efforts to expand the tourism market in North America and Europe Taiwan has been ranked as the cheapest place in the world to travel to this year, based on a list recommended by NerdWallet. The San Francisco-based personal finance company said that Taiwan topped the list of 16 nations it chose for budget travelers because US tourists do not need visas and travelers can easily have a good meal for less than US$10. A bus ride in Taipei costs just under US$0.50, while subway rides start at US$0.60, the firm said, adding that public transportation in Taiwan is easy to navigate. The firm also called Taiwan a “food lover’s paradise,” citing inexpensive breakfast stalls
TRADE: A mandatory declaration of origin for manufactured goods bound for the US is to take effect on May 7 to block China from exploiting Taiwan’s trade channels All products manufactured in Taiwan and exported to the US must include a signed declaration of origin starting on May 7, the Bureau of Foreign Trade announced yesterday. US President Donald Trump on April 2 imposed a 32 percent tariff on imports from Taiwan, but one week later announced a 90-day pause on its implementation. However, a universal 10 percent tariff was immediately applied to most imports from around the world. On April 12, the Trump administration further exempted computers, smartphones and semiconductors from the new tariffs. In response, President William Lai’s (賴清德) administration has introduced a series of countermeasures to support affected
CROSS-STRAIT: The vast majority of Taiwanese support maintaining the ‘status quo,’ while concern is rising about Beijing’s influence operations More than eight out of 10 Taiwanese reject Beijing’s “one country, two systems” framework for cross-strait relations, according to a survey released by the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Thursday. The MAC’s latest quarterly survey found that 84.4 percent of respondents opposed Beijing’s “one country, two systems” formula for handling cross-strait relations — a figure consistent with past polling. Over the past three years, opposition to the framework has remained high, ranging from a low of 83.6 percent in April 2023 to a peak of 89.6 percent in April last year. In the most recent poll, 82.5 percent also rejected China’s
PLUGGING HOLES: The amendments would bring the legislation in line with systems found in other countries such as Japan and the US, Legislator Chen Kuan-ting said Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chen Kuan-ting (陳冠廷) has proposed amending national security legislation amid a spate of espionage cases. Potential gaps in security vetting procedures for personnel with access to sensitive information prompted him to propose the amendments, which would introduce changes to Article 14 of the Classified National Security Information Protection Act (國家機密保護法), Chen said yesterday. The proposal, which aims to enhance interagency vetting procedures and reduce the risk of classified information leaks, would establish a comprehensive security clearance system in Taiwan, he said. The amendment would require character and loyalty checks for civil servants and intelligence personnel prior to
RSS