2016 will mark a major turning point in the roaming landscape, especially in Europe with the first stage of mandated reductions in roaming fees, leading to the end of roaming charges within and between the member states in 2017. As of April 2016, the maximum surcharge will be €0.05 per minute for calls, €0.02 for texts and €0.05 per megabyte for data.
This will inevitably give rise to a surge in roaming traffic; industry analysts at Ovum have suggested that roaming use will exceed home use. People are less likely to have Wi-Fi abroad than at home – on average, two-thirds of people’s smartphone data usage at the moment is via Wi-Fi rather than cellular. People also tend to have more leisure time when they are away, meaning more time to upload photos, videos or even to stream content such as movies or live sports.
2016 will also see many high profile events such as the European Championship Football matches and the Olympics. Clearly, roaming traffic usage will increase with multiple significant volume spikes during the year.
Right now is the right time to anticipate the network impacts and to plan for capacity and redundancy needs. By working together to align your roaming marketing plans and capacity needs, we can ensure that you maximize the business opportunities while delivering the high-quality user experience your subscribers demand.
The iBasis event team will first run a capacity and utilization audit, review critical destinations and then jointly develop a strategic plan to ensure the appropriate upgrade, if needed, and the best utilization to avoid any network congestion that would impact your overall customer experience.
To learn more about planning for 2016 roaming, better anticipating your network needs and how iBasis can help, please contact the event management team through: bvanheyningen@ibasis.net