It's always been one of the European mobile industry's conventional wisdoms: that one of the main reasons Europe became undisputed global leader in all things mobile was because of its call charge regime.
By making mobile service 'caller pays' one of the inhibitors for early market take-up was removed. The mobilised telephony user could swan about happily taking all calls, but only making as many as he or she deemed affordable. The great fear - the unforeseen astronomical mobile phone bill - was slain and mobile service uptake was brisk partly as a result
Meanwhile in the US a different logic had prevailed. There it was deemed more right and proper that the liberated, untethered phone user pay for the privilege of being so, not his hapless caller. Also it was rightly understood that without a receiver-pays regime there was a weaker mechanism for call price competition, since the callee was unaffected by the cost of the incoming calls.
Loaded up with the cost of the airtime leg of both incoming and outgoing calls, however, the service user was more likely to shop about and the service provider was more likely to keep the pricing keen - which the research seems to indicate is the case.
In fact both effects are observably true on the different sides of the Atlantic.
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