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>My first wild guess would again be regulatory: do they have to eat the extra costs involved so they provide you with the same price every month? Nope, only on

>My first wild guess would again be regulatory: do they have to eat the extra costs involved so they provide you with the same price every month? Nope, only one network does it (the same network in the article) and it is one of their many great features.

chrismeller 12y ago
As cstross mentions in another comment talking about Three it seems to be part of a big "Fell at Home" marketing campaign. With no other obligation to do so, I would simply assume they saw it as a good opportunity to stand out in a crowded market. The all-you-can-eat nature seems to include voice as well as data abroad, but I haven't seen any mention of international calling. Calling another UK number I'm sure works as normal, but presumably you still pay the regular rates if you call a US number? They certainly do if they call you. If you're just visiting the states for a week or two that's not nearly as big a deal (use the free local calls from the hotel phone to order pizza), but longer trips (school or business) would still involve meeting a larger group of people and become cost-prohibitive (for both parties). Combined with the limited number of customers who would be traveling internationally at all and likely the ability to get some sort of bulk-purchase agreement with whichever carrier in the US they use and they're probably just happy to eat the (relatively) limited expense to get the added customers. Like I mentioned in another comment, it also plays heavily into our hatred of limits. If I want to skip off to NYC for the weekend, I don't want to have to figure out what to do about my phone first! The "don't worry about it, we've got you covered" approach is probably working out really, really well for them, even for the large majority of people who never travel... because they might, one day. In the meantime they keep paying every month.

chrismeller 12y ago

As cstross mentions in another comment talking about Three it seems to be part of a big "Fell at Home" marketing campaign. With no other obligation to do so, I would simply assume they saw it as a good opportunity to stand out in a crowded market. The all-you-can-eat nature seems to include voice as well as data abroad, but I haven't seen any mention of international calling. Calling another UK number I'm sure works as normal, but presumably you still pay the regular rates if you call a US number? They certainly do if they call you. If you're just visiting the states for a week or two that's not nearly as big a deal (use the free local calls from the hotel phone to order pizza), but longer trips (school or business) would still involve meeting a larger group of people and become cost-prohibitive (for both parties). Combined with the limited number of customers who would be traveling internationally at all and likely the ability to get some sort of bulk-purchase agreement with whichever carrier in the US they use and they're probably just happy to eat the (relatively) limited expense to get the added customers. Like I mentioned in another comment, it also plays heavily into our hatred of limits. If I want to skip off to NYC for the weekend, I don't want to have to figure out what to do about my phone first! The "don't worry about it, we've got you covered" approach is probably working out really, really well for them, even for the large majority of people who never travel... because they might, one day. In the meantime they keep paying every month.