Summary Report on the public consultation on the review and prolongation of the Roaming Regulation 2020

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Objectives of the consultation

Since June 2017, EU-citizens have been able to use mobile services without additional charges, when travelling within the EU/EEA. Roam-Like-At-Home (RLAH) was introduced by Regulation (EU) 2015/2120, amending Regulation (EU) 531/2012 (the ‘Roaming Regulation’). The Roaming Regulation is due to expire on 30 June 2022. Without a prolongation, the RLAH benefits may be lost for consumers and businesses, and additional barriers could limit the seamless use of mobile services and innovative applications in the Digital Single Market.

The European Commission ran a public consultation on the review and prolongation of the Roaming Regulation for 12 weeks, from 19 June to 11 September 2020. The consultation aimed to gather information for the Impact Assessment of a Commission legislative proposal for the review of the Roaming Regulation. This initiative is included in the Commission’s Work Programme 2020 under the Policy Objective “A Europe fit for the Digital Age” addressing the specific objective “Digital for consumers”.

The stakeholder consultation had the following objectives:

1. To collect views on retail roaming services and on the impact of prolonging retail rules. This also included views on the impact of introducing clarifications and improvements to the Roaming Regulation, that are relevant for consumers, e.g. related to the quality of service, value-added services and emergency communications.
2. To collect views on the provision of wholesale roaming services, the prolongation of wholesale rules, on the sustainability of providing RLAH, and on the need to respond to new technological and business developments (e.g. on Machine-to-Machine services and Internet of Things).
3. To collect views on the possible reduction of administrative burden, and the impact of possible simplifications.

Who replied to the consultation?

Out of 175 respondents from 26 countries, 108 were EU citizens and 2 non-EU citizens, 5 consumer organisations, 10 business associations, 5 public authorities, 3 NGOs, 42 company/business organisations of which 25 were mobile network operators or representing them, 9 mobile virtual operators or representing them and 8 trade or other business stakeholders (e.g. verticals, SMEs).

The respondents' profiles reflects the self-selecting nature of a public consultation and imposes a certain caution when interpreting the results, since the responses cannot be considered as a representative random sample of all European users. For instance, this public consultation does not represent the views of national regulatory authorities, which were subject to a targeted consultation and did not participate widely in the public consultation (3 national regulatory authorities and 2 government authorities).

Figure 1: Distribution of PC responses by type of respondent

Preliminary findings observed in the replies

Without prejudice to the in-depth analysis of the replies, we can observe the following overall trends.

Overall functioning of the Roaming Regulation and benefits for end-users

The public consultation confirms the overall success and effectiveness of the Roaming Regulation. 65% of all respondents across groups replied that the Roaming Regulation has significantly promoted the interests of the citizens and businesses in the EU/EEA. 96% of the citizens strongly agree (87%) or agree (9%) that they can enjoy the benefits that the Regulation aims to bring. The benefits include staying connected without having to restrict their usage of roaming mobile services when travelling in the EU/EEA, not worrying about having to pay excessive costs for the use of mobile services while travelling in the EU/EEA and continuing to use mobile services like at home while travelling in the EU/EEA.

89% of the 175 respondents agree that EU intervention has had a positive effect in ensuring that roaming users do not pay excessive roaming prices in the EU/EEA compared to what could be achieved by Member States themselves. 48% think that the Roaming Regulation has been significantly effective in the development of the Digital Single Market, while 27% think it has been moderately effective.

The public consultation confirms the continued need for the Roaming Regulation for EU citizens and businesses. As regards the relevance of the Roaming Regulation, 74% of all respondents think that the relevance is significant. 70% of all respondents strongly agree and 13% agree that end-users would lose the benefits of using mobile services like at home, without any regulation on EU roaming.

Review of wholesale roaming markets

The majority of respondents acknowledge that the EU intervention had a positive effect on the sustainability of the roaming markets and competition on the wholesale roaming markets.

More than half of the respondents (54%) agree with the statement that wholesale price regulation is necessary for the provision of RLAH at retail level in line with the domestic charging model. The majority of respondents expect that the possible impact of removing  wholesale price regulation would be negative, specifically leading to an increase in wholesale roaming prices and retail domestic prices, and a decrease of the sustainability for mobile virtual operators, in particular.

Quality of Service

46% of the respondents consider that the wholesale roaming access obligation in the current Roaming Regulation is sufficient to ensure that access is given to 4G and 5G for wholesale roaming. 31% of the respondents do not think that the current wholesale obligations are sufficient. Mobile network operators in particular, but also some business associations and public authorities agree that the current provision in the Regulation is technology-neutral. Several mobile virtual operators on the other hand welcome a clarification. They note that they have experienced long delays in being granted access to 4G networks and fear that bottlenecks on 5G roaming could emerge.

There is overall support from stakeholders as regards strengthening the quality of service requirements in the Roaming Regulation. Citizens and consumer organisations especially support additional measures, while the mobile operators are more divided. Mobile network operators are less inclined to agree that additional measures would be relevant, while virtual operators  are overall more supportive.

Emergency Services

41% of respondents agree that communications with emergency services while roaming works well. These answers indicate that emergency communication through a voice call to 112 seem to work well, even if 54% of respondents indicated that they have a neutral stance  or have no opinion on the matter.  On the other hand, the replies indicate lack of awareness of the availability of alternative means of access to emergency services in different Member States, for end-users with disabilities. The majority, 76% of respondents, indicate a total lack of awareness.

Value-Added Services

72% of the respondents confirmed the need for additional measures in the Roaming Regulation to avoid unexpected charges due to the use of Value-Added Services.

Next steps

The Commission is now carrying out a deeper analysis of the replies received (available on the Better Regulation Portal). The results, which are non-binding for the Commission, will feed into the Commission's legislative proposal and assessment on the review of the Roaming Regulation in the course of 2020/21.