[188788] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: phone fun,
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Owen DeLong)
Fri Apr 15 15:32:54 2016
X-Original-To: nanog@nanog.org
From: Owen DeLong <owen@delong.com>
In-Reply-To: <20160415190936.043B346BE4B9@rock.dv.isc.org>
Date: Fri, 15 Apr 2016 12:28:25 -0700
To: Mark Andrews <marka@isc.org>
Cc: "John R. Levine" <johnl@iecc.com>, nanog@nanog.org
Errors-To: nanog-bounces@nanog.org
> On Apr 15, 2016, at 12:09, Mark Andrews <marka@isc.org> wrote:
>=20
>=20
> In message <571105A6.3040607@nvcube.net>, Nikolay Shopik writes:
>>> On 15/04/16 17:51, John R. Levine wrote:
>>> Putting mobiles into a handful of non-geographic codes as they do in
>>> Europe wouldn't work because the US is a very large country, long
>>> distance costs and charges were important, and they needed to be able
>>> to charge more for a mobile call across the country than across the
>>> street.
>>=20
>> I would like to add that Russian mobiles in non-geographic codes and
>> have free incoming calls (it wasn't until 2006) and also very large
>> territory. But that created internal roaming prices within country.
>>=20
>> So if you are making call not from your home region you'll pay more also
>> you may pay for incoming call too (unless you pay for such option to
>> make your abroad incoming calls free)
>=20
> Australia is about the area as the US and has always had caller
> pays and seperate area codes for mobiles. Call costs are independent
> of the mobiles location unless you are OS where the callee picks
> up the OS component of the voice call (incoming SMS's are usually
> free even if you are OS, they slug you with replies however).
AU has about the same area, but nowhere near the number/population density, s=
o the comparison isn't particularly apt.=20
>=20
> I've also got a US SIM and had my credit run to zero dollars with
> the phone turned off due to the sillyness of the US system. No
> calls or SMS being delivered but I'm still getting charged.
If you are going prepaid in the US, most likely you are transient (foreign t=
raveler) or impoverished. As such, the companies want to collect something f=
rom you for the cost of keeping your account in the system. It's a way to av=
oid the costs associated with number abandonment. Usually within three month=
s (or less) of your account going to $0, your number will be recycled and li=
kely reissued to someone else within 60 days of being marked available.=20
It's not so much silliness as a necessity in this market.=20
Owen
