Luxembourg, 10 October, 2012 – MACH, the leading provider of cloud-based managed communication services, today announced that it is seeing unprecedented demand amongst the world’s mobile network operators for its quick-to-market, data roaming transparency solution. Called the MACH Bill Shock Prevention Solution, it eliminates ‘bill shock’, alleviates consumer concerns associated with high data roaming charges and protects operators against increasing bad debt as a consequence of unpaid bills. The company says it is in discussions with 45 mobile operators worldwide around its Bill Shock Prevention solution, following the GSMA’s launch of its Data Roaming Transparency Initiative in June this year.

As part of its initiative, the GSMA recommends that mobile network operators meet three key criteria, including sending text messages to remind customers of roaming tariffs upon their arrival abroad, data roaming spending limits and alerts when data usage approaches a set limit, and the temporary suspension of data services when usage exceeds the agreed spending limit. These guidelines have led to increased pressure for operators to look for solutions which can eliminate ‘bill shock’ and be implemented ahead of the GSMA’s tight deadlines. The 25 operator groups and GSMA board members who initially signed up to the scheme have agreed to adopt these measures by December 2012, while the more than 40 Latin America operators who signed up to the scheme in September this year have agreed to implement by June 2013. MACH’s Bill Shock Prevention solution ensures compliance with all of the guidelines of the GSMA’s initiative, and can be implemented in just 12 weeks.

Tue From Hermansen, Director, Mobile Data and Advanced Networks, MACH, commented: “MACH fully supports the GSMA’s initiative and it is excellent to see that operators are heeding the call for more clarity and transparency on data roaming billing. With both deadlines looming, it seems that many operators who have signed up to the initiative are taking steps to ensure they have a robust solution in place. Given the advantages for operators who minimize subscriber concerns over bill shock – such as higher roaming revenues, significantly reduced exposure to refunds, greater customer satisfaction and reduced churn – it will also be interesting to see how long the other operators take to adopt the GSMA’s guidelines.”

“As a cloud-based managed service, our Bill Shock Prevention Solution not only fully supports the GSMA’s recommendations, but it can also be implemented in 12 weeks, making it possible for operators to meet the GSMA’s tight timescales. We welcome the chance to speak to operators about this further at BARG #80 in Athens,” Hermansen added.

The GSMA is working to promote billing transparency guidelines across its membership base of nearly 800 mobile operators. To learn more about the GSMA’s initiative and how MACH can help meet these recommendations, operators are invited to speak to MACH at the GSMA’s 80th Billing and Accounting Roaming Group (BARG) meeting in Athens on 16th – 18th October 2012.

Part of MACH’s M Serve cloud-based portfolio of fast-to-market mobile data monetization services, Bill Shock Prevention monitors subscriber data roaming usage in real-time and provides immediate alerts. Operators can pre-define usage thresholds that then trigger alerts to the operator and send SMS notifications to subscribers. These thresholds can be differentiated across geographical regions and also across ARPU segments, if an operator chooses to use the solution’s subscriber segmentation capability. End-users are able to query data usage when roaming through SMS to gain real-time insight into their current usage levels. In certain cases, operators can block data traffic when consumption reaches particularly high-levels, thereby avoiding the risk of bad debt, and they also have the ability to opt-in to continue data spending, achieving a win-win solution for themselves and their subscribers.