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Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to review the effectiveness of the various initiatives taken to regulate international mobile roaming over the last decade.

Design/methodology/approach – The paper is an analysis of the policies and the measures and their effects on prices and industry dynamics.

Findings – The paper finds that economic approaches through both competition law and the current European Union regulatory package failed. However, an ad hoc political initiative by a determined European Commissioner did finally work.

Research limitations/implications – Lack of industry data, disaggregated for roaming, makes it difficult to determine the eventual effects on operators. Further data on revenues and on any increase in demand from price reductions would greatly help understanding.

Practical implications – In this paper the use of a relatively crude policy instrument raises concerns about the use of more sophisticated economic approaches in difficult cases.

Originality/value – The paper reviews the sequence of efforts and the problems encountered.