A European Parliament Committee has backed rules that would make cheaper mobile-roaming tariffs available only for new customers and those who explicitly tell their operators that they want to pay less.

Consumers pay widely differing and sometimes surprisingly high prices when they place or receive calls on their mobile phones while travelling in another European country.

Information Society Commissioner Viviane Reding has identified these prices as one of the issues where EU regulation could directly benefit consumers. Several appeals to mobile operators to self-regulate were, according to the Commission, not sufficiently heeded.

At the start of the 2006 holiday season, the Commission presented a draft regulation aimed at bringing down roaming prices at wholesale as well as retail level, introducing a cap on levies charged by operators on the customer’s home network.

The Parliament’s Internal Market Committee adopted on 7 March, with the votes of the EPP-ED (centre-right) and ALDE (Liberal) groups, an amendment that would allow mobile operators to maintain the present, higher prices for all current contracts, unless consumers declare that they want to be part of the price-cap scheme.

MEPs also adopted an amendment by the Liberal group, which foresees a three-year “sunset clause”, after which the regulation would cease to be effective.

As a result of the watering-down, even the rapporteur, Joseph Muscat (PSE, Malta) voted against his own report, which he felt he could no longer support.

Information Society Commissioner Viviane Reding declared: “I find it regrettable that many in the European Parliament want only new customers to profit automatically from cheaper roaming tariffs. Mobile-phone penetration in the EU is today at 103 per cent – there are thus not many consumers who would profit from the EU regulation if it would apply automatically only to new customers.” She added: “The whole debate about ‘opt-in’ – ‘opt-out’ is also about who finally will have to be in charge of advertising for cheaper roaming tariffs. I believe the burden of proof should be on the operators to demonstrate that their packages are really cheaper – and thereby to convince consumers to ‘opt out’ from the consumer-protection tariff. If consumers first of all will have to ‘opt-in’ to the cheaper consumer protection tariff, then operators will be able to rely on the passivity of many consumers. And it will in the end be the European taxpayer who will have to pay for national regulators and the European institutions to explain to every single consumers that they have a right now to opt-in.”

BEUC, the European consumer organisation, declared itself “extremely disappointed” by the committee vote. BEUC Director Jim Murray said: “MEPs voted for higher prices for consumers, compared with the Commission proposal. By only granting new clients the ‘opt-out’ possibility, they left most EU consumers unprotected and at the mercy of telecom operators.”

The rapporteur, MEP Joseph Muscat (PSE, Malta), said: “The liberal and right-wing compromise means that everything stays as it is and that the consumers have to ask specifically for this new tariff. At the same time, it assumes that operators will advertise against their own interest in favour of an EU tariff. It’s more likely that turkeys will vote for Christmas.”

Danish MEP Karin Riis-Jørgensen, of the ALDE (Liberal) group, which supported the watering-down, said: “Our over-riding concern is to deliver a concrete and speedy result for Europe’s consumers after years of excessive mobile roaming charges,” adding that “the final aim of any regulation in this area shall be a true single market for mobile telephone charges with the aim of abolishing roaming charges altogether”.

German Green MEP Heide Rühle said: “The Commission proposal to introduce caps on roaming charges would be a marked improvement in terms of consumer protection in the mobile-phone market. However, the amendments adopted by the IMCO committee would give service providers a loophole to continue taking advantage of their customers. The Greens hope that when the EP votes in plenary session, MEPs will vote to guarantee protection to mobile-phone customers and reject the proposed ‘opt-out clause’.”

On 21 March, the Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee (ECON) voted its opinion on the draft Regulation on roaming. On 22 March, the Internal Market and Consumer Protection Committee (IMCO; associated with the lead Committee in a ‘Hughes procedure’) and the Culture and Education Committee (CULT) followed suit.

On 12 April, the Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE) Committee will vote on the proposed regulation. ITRE is the lead committee; the rapporteur is Paul Ruebig (EPP-ED, Austria). The shadow rapporteurs are Reimo Paasilinna (PSE, Finland), Šarunas Birutis (ALDE, Lithuania), Miloslav Ransdorf and Umberto Guidoni (GUE/NGL; Czech Republic and Italy, respectively).

The report will be debated and voted in the Parliament’s May plenary.

It will then be dealt with and possibly adopted at the Telecom Council on 7 June, in order to become effective before the summer travel season. It will enter into force on the day following its publication in the Official Journal and be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all member States.