Roaming

Annual report

Introduction

In accordance with Art. 12 a^bis para. 2 of the Telecommunications Act (TCA), the Federal Office of Communications (OFCOM) monitors the international roaming market and analyses price trends and technical developments. To fulfil this mandate, it compiles roaming statistics that record the number of customers, the volumes of roaming data, SMS and voice call minutes used, and international roaming revenues generated by the three mobile network operators. This information is used to produce various indicators and compare them over time. In addition to ensuring transparency, these activities enable OFCOM to fulfil its market monitoring mandate, which includes recording volume trends (consumer behaviour) and average prices for standard tariffs and options.

Since 2021, OFCOM has been gathering roaming statistics using a new questionnaire with more precise categories, such as the standard tariffs for data roaming. All data relating to the period before 2021 is included in the attached Excel spreadsheet. Please note that the individual statistics have been revised and are therefore not fully comparable with previous publications. Any gaps and outliers in the providers’ data have been replaced by standard statistical estimation methods. Certain categories, particularly prepaid categories in the rest of the world (RoW) zone, have been excluded, as they are currently unusable due to erroneous data.

In recent years, the Swiss mobile phone market has seen an increase in the number of mobile phone services where roaming is either partially or fully included in the basic price (flat rate). In this product category, the price paid by customers is independent of the amounts of voice, SMS or data roaming they actually use. Providers do not record these revenues separately, which means they cannot be reported. As such, OFCOM has adapted its questionnaire. New international roaming regulations have also been introduced under the revised Ordinance on Telecommunications Services (OTS), which entered into force in 2021.

Due to the increasing use of mobile broadband services, traditional services (including SMS and voice calls) are being replaced by applications such as Threema and WhatsApp. As far as technically possible, these traditional services are also handled via the foreign data network when in roaming mode. While billed as broadband between roaming partners, end customers are billed for the traditional voice or SMS service. For these reasons, the focus of this publication is on data roaming. It can be seen that the volume of data roaming has increased year-on-year and that use of voice and SMS roaming is stagnating or declining (see section on demand).

Costumers

Since 2021, OFCOM has been asking roaming service providers how many of their customers have actually used roaming each quarter, which type of contract they have (postpaid/prepaid) and which tariff structure they have chosen (flat rate/standard tariff/option). However, the number of customers who actually use roaming can easily be overestimated. For instance, a person who pays a flat rate with inclusive roaming may travel abroad several times within a quarter or make a short call via the standard tariff after their inclusive volume has been used up. Most people have a flat rate to use roaming, and this trend is still growing. In other words, most people with a Swiss mobile phone contract who also use their device abroad have roaming included in the basic monthly fee, whether partially or fully. There is also a slight upward trend in the number of people who use options or standard tariffs.

Development of demand for roaming services by customers of Swiss providers

In the following table, the quarterly figures are added together to form an annual total. The vast majority of voice calls abroad are made from flat-rate contract with roaming included in the price. In the years 2021 to 2023, usage habits for voice roaming calls did not change significantly. By contrast, use of data services grew by 61 per cent in 2021/2022 and 39 per cent in 2022/2023. This is presumably related to travel patterns after the COVID-19 crisis and the fact that customers are replacing traditional telephone services, such as roaming voice calls and SMS, with equivalent services that operate via a broadband connection (including Threema, Skype and WhatsApp). In addition, some countries handle the technical aspects of these traditional services via broadband (e.g. Voice over LTE and Voice over IP), but the end customer is still billed based on traditional units (per minute / per SMS).

Revenue

At around 11 per cent, the change in annual revenue from 2021 to 2022 is slightly positive. However, the change from 2022 to 2023 is negative at around –14 per cent. The increase in 2021/2022 is mainly due to a rise of 30 per cent year-on-year in data roaming revenue, while the other services recorded a decline in revenue compared to the previous year. The year-on-year decline of 14 per cent in 2022/2023 is based on the trends for all roaming services. A comparison with the usage figures for the same period is helpful (see section on demand). Use of voice calls via standard tariffs and options declined slightly during this period. Revenue via standard tariffs and options for voice/SMS telephony are developing similarly, showing a relatively stable price level (see section on average price). For data roaming via standard tariffs and options, usage rose steadily from 2021 to 2023, while revenue increased less strongly in 2021/2022 and fell again in 2022/2023.

What have Swiss customers paid on average for international roaming since 2017?

OFCOM gathers revenue and volume data for each roaming service four times a year. This information is used to calculate the average prices paid for voice, data and SMS roaming. Average price analysis cannot be carried out for contracts with inclusive roaming units, as the mobile operators charge a monthly flat rate that prevents their revenue from being broken down by use of the different services. A survey of Swiss mobile phone operators also revealed that they were unable to provide an estimate. However, the cost analysis is relevant to standard and optional tariffs, as they tend to be favoured by price-sensitive users. From the consumer’s perspective, standard tariffs can also sometimes be an unintentional or unwanted cause of bill shock.

Consideration of these average prices is therefore still relevant today, because although bill shocks are a less frequent occurrence for Swiss phone customers due to bundled services (see sections on customers and demand), individuals can still experience a nasty surprise after their holidays if they receive a high roaming bill.

In 2021 to 2023, the per-minute price of a voice call was on average around eight times more expensive for a standard tariff than for an option. To establish whether an option is actually worthwhile compared to the standard tariff, it is advisable to simulate the predicted price using a tariff calculator on the relevant mobile phone provider’s website or via independent comparison services.

For data roaming, there is a much larger discrepancy between the standard tariffs and the price of options. In 2023, data roaming prices per megabyte for postpaid contracts, particularly in the EU, do not offer sufficiently useful insight due to issues with providers’ data delivery. However, it is still evident that data roaming options are better for frequent users.

Difference between minutes paid for and minutes used

Following the introduction of the new Telecommunications Act and the end of the transition period on 30 June 2021, providers are required to charge their customers for roaming calls on a per-second basis. Previously, providers rounded up each roaming call minute that had been started to the next full minute.

The effect of regulation introduced in mid-2021 is clearly visible in the chart below. The value falls from around 18 per cent to a low single-digit figure (5 per cent) for calls via the standard tariff. This means consumers were billed for almost 14 per cent fewer minutes for calls in the EU from one quarter to the next, demonstrating how efficient this regulatory measure has been for consumers. The new regulation has reduced the large discrepancy between paid and consumed call minutes. However, the percentage will never reach 0, as Article 10c paragraph 1 letter a OTS allows providers to charge for the first 30 seconds of each call to cover connection costs.