Telco question, primarily for non Americans and Canadians

[Jeslek]

OK I've been talking to some people. I'm in the telecommunications industry, and I know quite a bit on how things work. However, most of it is restricted to a system called NANP (North American Numbering Plan), and the definition documents that go with it.

The world uses a system called ITU, but that is also just recommendations. Each country has its own implementations.

I have a few questions for people from outside North America, because I'm not awfully familiar with how that works. Yeah I've traveled, but I never really paid attention because I wasn't in the telco industry. I will start off by just giving a short overview of how North America works:


In North America, calls are categorized as local and long distance. For those two types of calls, you have two companies.

Local calls are completed by your phone company. Typically you can't pick one, as they own the lines in the neighborhood. For example, we can only pick Bell Canada to buy phone service from. It costs us a certain amount per month for the line rental, and that includes unlimited number of local calls on their own network.

Local calls are calls dialed without a "1" or "0" prefix.

If you dial a call with a "1" or "0", "1" indicating long distance and "0" indicating long distance with a calling card, the switch that takes your call will request a long distance line from your long distance carrier. A carrier is a company that will carry your call and terminate it at the right location. Typically, you can pick whatever carrier gives you the best rates. These include the big ones such as AT&T, MCI, Sprint, Bell, and so on, but also the several thousand smaller companies that provide long distance such as Connect to America.



Anyways, when you get a telephone, you typically pay a monthly fee to your service provider (Bell Canada for me), and a monthly fee to your long distance carrier (AT&T Canada for me, at this point). You can switch carriers at any time. For example, 8 months ago I was with AT&T. Bell Canada phoned me and told me that they would like our service, and if we stay with them for 6 months, they would give us $100 in free international calls since 85% of our calls are international. We accepted even though they charged a little more than AT&T. After 6 months we got the $100, and then switched back to AT&T because they have better rates. (8¢ a minute to Britain, and 12¢ a minute to most of continental Europe, 8¢ to Hong Kong too)


Now here is my question. How does it work in Britain and Netherlands and Brazil and wherever you are from? I know they have, or used to, have government controlled monoplies which allowed for only one government-owned telecommunication provider. That led to a few bad things, including high prices and poorer service.

For example, I'm pretty sure they pay for all local calls in Britain, and probably in Netherlands too.

Can you switch long distance providers? Do you even have such a thing? I'm very uninformed with how you guys work and this being my industry, I would really like to learn more.

Thanks.

 

[Luis G]

Local:
There's one major local company in Mexico called Telmex , which owns the local wiring, any other company can offer the service, but they would have to put wiring on their own. There's also some companies that are going wireless, they put a small receptor in the top of your house and you can use a regular phone with the existing house wiring.
Local calls have no time limit, but you pay per call.

Long distance:
You can choose the company you want, there are several, although the biggest ones are Telmex, Alestra (aka AT&T Mexico) and Avantel (aka MCI Mexico).
You pay per call duration.

 

[Jeslek]

Mexico is slowly but steadily entering the North American numbering plan. A big part of it is already based on it. Didn't know you pay for local calls though.

 

[Luis G]

yes, it is kind of a long story, but here goes the short version, Telmex was owned by the goverment, then the gvmt sold it, and that includes all the infrastructer (wiring). Carlos Slim (one of the richest guys in the world) bought the company, and he has this kind of monopoly on it, so he can do whatever he wants with the company and charge you whatever he wants. And since he owns the city's wiring, no other companies can use it. So it is kind of..screwed. There are rumours about how our gvmt is planning to split Telmex, into the "phone company" and the "wiring" company.

 

[ris]

british telecom [bt] is the main service provider, was owned by the government i believe until the 80s when it was privatised. since then some smaller localised cable providers have appeared in some cities. that is maily for the local loop [uk calls], competition is mainly for local rate stuff.

you pay for local calls [and some charge difference by distance] and also by time of day with some providers. my telco [cable company ntl] only charges by time of day, so there is no distance charging at all.

as for international, i've not called enough to know really. scandinavia was damn expensive on ntl, and ny was sorta pricey too. but you can sign up to international specialists at any time and i think have multiple ones should you wish. you dial a prefix to your phone to access the intrnl provider and then the regular code. i know that onetel is very popular with those i know who dial international a lot.

in short - one local [uk] provider [ntl, telewest, bt or whatever] and then whatever international provider you feel like.

incidentally, you mentioned poor service with the government-run telco's. since privatisation bt has restricted competition by denying other providers access to the local loop of phone connections. mainly this is stopped broadband access being more competitive but it has also left prices frozen and effectively stifled competition. pressure from the telecoms watchdog is bearing some fruit, but it is very slow progress that is damaging the consumer.
its amazing what a monopoly can do when it is big enough.