Unlimited and Flat approaches are natively Low Cost

(la version Française du post ci-dessous se trouve ici!)

Unmetering and non segmentation is at essence of low cost,

in the meantime,

Billing communication per usage and per-equated taxes are synonym of charging more and getting less!

I wish to remind this (for me) obvious reality. I wish to do it today, when everyone in France debates about two related subjects:

• how the new French mobile Operator "Free" is at least two times cheaper than incumbent competitors offers, 
• why is a VAT rate raise an efficient taxation solution compared to other sophisticated taxes implementation.

Complexity of metering telecommunications and segmenting taxes is related to :

1. PRE-BUILDING COSTS: a lot of statistical studies (market study, opinion study, economical data...) and a lot of advisory costs in order to build an a priori justification of the choices one is going to make
2. BUILDING COSTS : IT tools for metering usage or determining the taxes basis, human and IT resources for complex money invoicing/calling, complex IT administration tools and thus trainings to monitor the process.
3. SUPPORT and MAINTENANCE COSTS: because complexity is questioning and error prone, the complex offers running on a large human base, it will rapidly raise need for a lot of exceptions handling. These exceptions that the developers or project designers did not figure out. This implies armies of IT support and call center care.

As opposed :

1. When the Communications Operator's clients use the resource for free or for a flat cost (paid by subscription) with no restrictions, the operations process is fully transparent: a technical network maintenance tool, an authentication service in the system, and  a very simple customization of any CRM software package off-the-shelf. Some 100% free systems with no subscription even avoid the authentication and the CRM issues. 
2. In a VAT tax like in a (quasi) Flat income tax perceived at origin (like in the UK) the simplicity comes from the calculation of the tax, from the"self care" of the system : the companies are collecting and paying these taxes, there is no headache and less "bad debt" risk for the Tax Man.
3. At last but not least, the simplicity of the unlimited telecom offers like the VAT raise or flat tax decisions diminishes the need for client service and abolishes the need for a strong posteriori control and repression.

Therefore, as the unlimited and flat approaches are costing less to produce and to operate they can be charged substantially less to the end-users.
Simple things once again seem to be efficient: why are we then always looking for complexity ? Maybe just a human way of generating systemic occupation.