CLAIMS that cell phone customers are being ripped off by greedy telecoms companies have been dismissed by industry officials.

In a recent letter to the which was also sent to Telecommunications Minister Michael Scott, an irate customer said he was now disputing ?a whopping bill? after arranging to use a three-band cell phone while on vacation in the UK and Slovenia.

?Unfortunately, the phone was essentially useless in Slovenia and had exceptionally bad reception in London,? he said.

And the customer alleged that Bermuda was probably the only place in the world where companies could ?double charge? for both incoming and outgoing calls.

?I had, from time to time, received calls on my cell phone from people soliciting the sale of stocks and bonds,? the correspondent said.

?Often they ring back when one has hung up on them, which of course constitutes another call for which I am invariably invoiced ? along with any unsolicited calls, wrong numbers or the many non-connect efforts made with my cell phone.

?It could easily be argued they are ?ripping off? people who use cellular telephones by effectively double charging on each call ? either made or received. In other words, is it legal to have this sort of charge structure in effect??

But this week two companies defended their operations, stating that Bermuda?s billing system was in no way unusual.

John Manderson, president of Wireless Solutions International Bermuda, conceded that using cell phones overseas was not always perfect ? but that local providers should not be blamed.

?The upside of roaming is that you can take your home mobile phone with a single number and if your cellular provider has enough agreements, travel all over the world and make and receive calls as if you were home,? Mr. Manderson said.

?This is fantastic for both security and for keeping in touch for important business calls.

?But the truth of the matter is there are and can be absolutely no guarantees that roaming will work 100 per cent of the time. There are too many variables and factors that all must be correct and working for it to work at all, but the most important thing is once you step off a plane in another country, your home cellular provider has zero control over your services from that point. You are literally and physically on some one else?s network.?

Responding to allegations of ?double charging?, Mr. Manderson pointed out that Bermuda operates the same system as that of the US and Canada, which differs from the UK and the rest of Europe.

?We have what is known as a ?bill and keep? method of charging for calls,? he said.

?In the UK, the calling party pays. What that really means is this ? the calling party, the one placing the call to the mobile phone, is paying for both parts of the call. They are in fact paying a premium rate to call that mobile phone so that the mobile does not pay for the incoming call.

?This is not double charging. In Bermuda each party pays for their piece of the call. In the UK, only the caller that is placing the call to the mobile pays, and they pay for both parts of the call. If in the UK, the caller was to pay this premium fee and the mobile was to be charged for the incoming call, this would indeed be double-charging, but this is not the case here.

?This is a decision they made in the UK and Europe when they first introduced cellular service. It has been adopted in other jurisdictions, but it is not the only way jurisdictions have decided to handle it. Double charging would be illegal if it were happening, but it is not.?

Mr. Manderson, who has 17 years? experience in the industry, said both systems of charging had merit, but that changing from one to the other would be ?a much larger challenge?.

But he added that, for business users, the ?bill and keep? method, had one advantage.

?Bear in mind, if you use your mobile phone for business and you expect people to call you on it to do business, today they only pay for their piece of the call,? he said.

?Do you think in the future, if ?calling party pays? is introduced, that they will want to pay for your piece too? Maybe they?ll just save themselves 50 cents and not bother.?

Mr. Manderson also pointed out that, while unsolicited calls were tiresome and costly, carriers could not be held responsible for unwanted calls.

?I would be the first to agree that these unsolicited calls are very frustrating to say the least, but as long as someone has a number to dial, you cannot stop them from dialling it,? he said.

?It is the same issue with unwanted e-mails, but at least you don?t have to pay for those directly.?

Andrew Bacon, Financial Controller for Digicel Bermuda, backed up Mr. Manderson?s points.

?Bermuda?s telecommunications market currently, and has always, operated under a ?bill and keep? regime where customers pay for calls made and received to their own service provider,? Mr. Bacon said.

?This regime applies to all service providers in the market, not just cellular phone providers.

?Changing to a ?calling party pays? regime would not reduce prices or benefit the customer.?