A recent conversation with a friend of mine revealed
that a lot of persons are still terrified of being hit by their mobile operator
with a large roaming bill and as a result switch their phones off altogether
when abroad as my friend did whilst in Miami, switching on only when free Wi-Fi
is available.
In
doing some research I came across a recent
report which identified 90 percent of phone users are ‘silent roamers”. This
obviously accounts for reduced revenue for providers from roaming subscribers
as they seek cheap local calls in the country they are visiting or stay off the
grid and use free Wi-Fi. With global roaming review set to increase to $90 billion by 2018 operators should be concerned about silent roamers.
The
report, which summarized data gathered from 114 mobile operators in 83 countries
also identified that 86% of subscribers lacked knowledge about how smartphones
work whilst roaming, which may present an opportunity for local operators via
further customer education to increase revenue. I wonder how many of us switch
off whilst roaming?
Are you a silent roamer?
Human nature is that people generally won't pay high prices for something they can get cheaper, or for free!
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