Oftel believes it is important for customers to check charges with their mobile operator before they travel. "When using your mobile phone abroad it's easy to get caught out by higher charges -- and by the fact that you get charged for receiving as well as making calls," warned David Edmonds, director general of Oftel. "Call costs vary a lot between different tariffs and many consumers are taken by surprise when they tot up their phone bill at the end of their trip." Edmonds added that it is often cheaper to just use text messages rather than making a voice call. Mobile operators are under fire from many sides over their pricing policies. Earlier this year, EU competition commissioner Mario Monti vowed to take action against operators who were overcharging customers for using their mobiles abroad. He said that an EU investigation had found that many operators were "engaged in excessive pricing." Oftel has also been active against the UK's mobile operators, but so far with limited success. It referred Orange, mmO2, T-Mobile and Vodafone to the Competition Commission in January this year, amid claims that the four companies are charging too much for calls made between their networks. A decision on this is not expected before the end of this year, though. More details of Oftel's research into overseas mobile charges can be found on Oftel's Web site.
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