Brussels  - European Union consumers will as from Saturday find it cheaper to make or receive calls on their mobile phone while travelling to another EU country.

According to the EU's Roaming Regulation, the current price cap of 0.49 euros (0.72 dollars) per minute (excluding VAT) for making a call while abroad will fall to 0.46 euros on August 30.

The maximum price that European mobile phone operators will be able to charge their customers for receiving a call while roaming will likewise fall, from 0.24 euros to 0.22 euros per minute.

The EU's Roaming Regulation, which came into force last summer and which is due to expire in 2010, foresees a third and final lowering of the price caps - to 0.43 and 0.19 euros respectively - on August 30, 2009.

Such price reductions do not involve sending text messages or surfing the internet.

"The next challenge is now to bring about a single (EU) market for roaming text messages and data services," said Viviane Reding, the EU's telecoms commissioner.

The European Commission introduced price caps after studies found that European mobile phone operators were applying excessive roaming charges to their customers
- on average 1.15 euros per minute.

National regulators say an independent cost analysis has shown that the EU caps are still 0.08 euros higher than they should be.

An EU study of the way in which the new so-called Eurotariffs are being applied has also revealed that mobile phone operators still display a tendency to overcharge their customers.

Some operators, for example, charge the full 2-minutes fare for a call lasting 1 minute and 2 seconds.

Customers across the EU's 27 member states are paying an average of 24 per cent more than the minutes they actually use to make calls.

So far, only France, Spain, Portugal and Lithuania have introduced rules forcing mobile phone companies to bill by the second. (dpa)