International roaming

International roaming is the ability to use your mobile phone when abroad on holiday or on business. Because your mobile phone company does not necessarily have a network in the country in which you are traveling, whenever you make or receive a call there you use – or are ‘roaming’ on - the network of an operator in that country. For providing this service, this Host Operator will charge a wholesale rate to your Home Operator who will, in turn, charge you a retail rate.

EU Regulation on international roaming

On 7 June 2007, the EU ministers for IT and telecommunications agreed politically to issue Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on roaming on public mobile telephone networks within the Community. Subsequently the Regulation has been translated into all 23 languages of the Community, and it was formally adopted by the Council on 25 June 2007. The next step is that the text of the Regulation will be published in the Official Journal on 29 June 2007, entering into force the next day (30 June 2007).
The Regulation will impose a number of obligations on Danish mobile providers and other mobile providers within EU regarding international roaming in the EU's internal market. Such obligations can be divided into four subelements:

• Wholesale price regulation - the prices that Danish mobile network providers are allowed to charge from foreign mobile network providers when consumers who have a mobile subscription in other parts of the EU's internal market use their mobile telephones in Denmark.
• Retail price regulation - the prices that Danish mobile providers are allowed to charge from their customers when the customers use their mobile telephone outside Denmark for calls within the EU's internal market.
• Consumer information - the information that Danish mobile providers must give their customers, both when the Regulation enters into force and on a regular basis later on.
• Reporting duty - the information that mobile providers must give the National IT and Telecom Agency to allow the Agency to supervise compliance with the Regulation and to allow the Agency to meet its reporting obligations in relation to the European Commission.