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To: gdichaz who wrote (7859)	3/23/2000 9:19:00 AM
From: Drew Williams	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 13582

Chaz, I think there are a lot of differences between the American situation and elsewhere. I think these have had more effect than caller pays on the adoption of cellular outside the USA. For example, during my lifetime we Americans have always enjoyed a ubiquitous, reasonably inexpensive, high quality, reliable wired phone system. I understand that my somewhat pampered life is not the universal experience. Except when my 1966 Corvair broke down on Interstate 80 in north central Pennsylvania in 1972 (where there is still no cellular service -- go Globalstar!) I never worried about being able to find a phone to use or how I would pay for it. But, the way I see it, when other countries started gearing up their cellular services, consumers were finally able to get what we've had all along with the added advantage of being able to walk around. Second, the cost structure has changed a lot. My company now pays about $.06 per minute. Ten years ago they were paying $.35 or so. I remember getting memo after memo about controlling cellular usage, but we don't get those anymore. Cost is not a factor any more. Utility is. The consumer situation is a little different, but I don't really see how caller pays helps there very much. Somebody still has to pay for the infrastructure, and diffusing the payments through non-subscribers' phone bills just increases the administrative overhead. I assume someone phoning a caller-pays subscriber will get a recording telling them the cost of proceeding before the connection is made and giving them the choice of hanging up or proceeding, and my guess is a lot of people will simply hang up. If this were not true, I know I would be really pissed by getting a bill when I did not expect it. Right now, the only person who knows or cares what the call costs is the cellular subscriber. Suddenly, everyone will have to make an economic decision as to whether the call is worth the cost. I see this change as a huge marketing negative and I expect this plan will be very unpopular. In Europe where they more or less started with caller pays, it did not matter, because it had always been that way. I have not been in Europe since 1967, so I could be completely wrong.