EXTRA costs of using a mobile phone in countries across the EU are to be scrapped, MEPs have agreed. The Commission to look into this issue was set up in 2005 and it has taken ONLY 12 years to get a decision! There’s efficiency for you!
But what does this mean for the average traveller? Well, theoretically, holidaymakers and businesses alike should not get the sometimes enormous, but always surprising, large invoices. But is that true? Not necessarily! dbfb would advise that when you are not at home or in the office you have more time for phone calls, text and particularly data. And if you don’t want to pay hotels’ exorbitant charges for wifi, which you already have at home and the office, you will ultimately use more on the local network. You will then go over your normal UK tariff and get, you guessed it, a big bill. So before going on that trip take a look at your normal usage on your invoice or your smartphone (use any five to 10-year-old if you are not sure how to do the latter) and ask your friendly supplier to up your tariff for the duration.
Our own government has at last decided that pouring billions of pounds into an antiquated telecoms infrastructure is not going to improve the UK’s lowly 57th position in the world’s connectivity league. The solution to that is ultrafast fibre. That is end-to-end connections purely in fibre. Not the current fibre to the cabinet and then standard copper to your home or office. Let’s catch up with the rest of the world with gigabit speeds readily available in many towns and cities right now. Northampton and Milton Keynes have these circuits in place whereas our near neighbours in Peterborough had to dig in new fibre and are already reaping the benefits.
20 years ago the Swedish city of Stockholm decided that fibre connectivity was vital to their future stability and economic growth. So the decision was taken to start from scratch and install pure fibre to premise circuitry. According to ICT research company ACREO the socio-economic impact on the city was 1,800,000,000 Euros (1.8bn) more than three times the investment and from 1996 to 2012 Local Government SAVED 250,000,000 Euros. If anyone would like a full copy of this report just email me –
And finally for those who read my article last month and are reading this on 1 March, there are now only 306 shopping days to Christmas!