Attention has been focused on US mobile contract termination charges by the FCC. Is it time the swingeing charges levied by some European mobile operators were also give the once-over? By Ian Scales.
By asking Verizon to explain its doubling of the Early Termination Charge (see - Victory as victim vanquishes voracious Verizon) the FCC just might make other jurisdictions sit up and take notice too.
In the UK, for instance, where full subsidies on phones are common, the contract termination process is very simple because there really isn't one. Users usually have to pay off the full price of the contract line rental for the term of the contract.
I like the way this is often phrased - the 'formula' is to take the monthly line rental and multiply it by the number of months remaining on the contract to come up with charge to end the contract.
So that's another way of saying that the customer has to pay out the remainder of the term: effectively paying for both the subsidised phone AND for the 'free' minutes and texts he or she would have consumed should the contract have been continued.
Not only does the user get no break at all at termination, but the operator gets all the money it was going to get anyway.
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