James Rosewell writes:

Due to growth in staff numbers my business (51Degrees.mobi) is in the process of moving offices. Coincidentally I'm also moving our home broadband. It’s not been a pleasant experience.

This got me thinking, because a few weeks ago on thefonecast.com we discussed why Ofcom isn’t treating Mobile Termination Rates (MTR) in the same way as fixed-line termination rates. The mobile industry justifies higher MTRs on the assumption that a mobile network costs more to run than a fixed-line network. It was certainly true when the fixed costs of running a mobile network had to be shared across a relatively small number of customers, even if they did pay a fortune for their contracts and terminals. Intuitively I'd say that’s just not true anymore.

Last April, UK telecoms regulator Ofcom suggested some changes to the way non-geographic numbers are regulated.

It wanted calls to numbers that began 080 and 116 to be free from all fixed-line and mobile phones; currently some mobile operators charge for calls that are ‘free’ from fixed lines. In addition, it proposed a new tariff structure for other non-geographic calls.

In this week's podcast news report we're talking about quarterly results from BlackBerry and Three UK, we're discussing the latest network complaints data from Ofcom and we're contemplating the arrival of a new Facebook phone.

There's also time to discuss EE's UK 4G rollout, a dramatic move from T-Mobile USA and a train ticket app from O2.

Ofcom has published its eighth quarterly report that show the level of complaints for telephone, broadband and pay TV services, covering the three months until the end of 2012.

The proportion of complaints about fixed-line phone, broadband, ‘pay as you go’ mobile phone and pay TV services decreased, although there was a slight increase in the proportion of ‘pay monthly’ mobile phone complaints.

Last March, UK telecoms regulator Ofcom published the findings of its review into ‘bill shock’ caused by unexpectedly high fixed-line and mobile phone bills.

It found that mobile phone customers with ‘pay monthly’ contracts were most likely to suffer an unexpectedly high bill, with the worst cases caused when customers used their phones outside Europe.