BT Cellnet, the UK operator, is due this week to launch what it claims is Britain's first consumer facility on general packet radio service (GPRS).

For GPRS launch plans of Western European operators Click here

For Western European timetable for awarding 3G licences Click here

This is the intermediate technology designed to allow operators to provide higher-speed data transmission and a so-called always-on connection over their existing second-generation (2G) networks, which use the general system for mobiles (GSM) standard.

The move is significant, because the consumer response to such services is expected to provide a crucial indicator of the likely level of demand for third-generation (3G) services, which in Europe and Japan will use wideband code division multiple access (W-CDMA) technology.

But it is likely to be some time before there is much evidence to go on, given the continued shortage of GPRS handsets. BT Cellnet, which launched its business GPRS service last June, and is now offering services at about 30 kilobits a second (roughly three times the speed of GSM), admits that it still has only about 500 users, divided between 35 corporate customers, including Cisco and Oracle. And there are some doubts about BT Cellnet's tariff structure, which involves charging consumers according to the volume of data they download, rather than the length of their calls.

This is because GPRS (also known as 2.5G) is a packet-switched service which provides the user with a virtually permanent connection. BT Cellnet, along with most of the 30 or so European operators now offering GPRS services, (see table), already uses the volume-based charging approach for corporate users.

It is offering consumers two tariff options. Under the first, users will pay £3.99 a month plus 2 pence for every kilobyte of data downloaded (roughly equal to one Wap page). Under the second, they will pay £7.99 a month for a package which includes 1 megabyte of data, with additional downloads charged at £3.99 per megabyte.

But many experts argue that this approach is inappropriate for consumers because they will not normally know how much data needs to be downloaded in accessing particular applications. So they may be reluctant to make much use of the service for fear of running up unexpectedly large bills. Research suggests consumers would prefer to pay a flat fee for the whole service or for a standard package containing the most popular services.

Meanwhile, Europe's 3G licensing process is set to start up again, after something of a lull since the Belgian auction fizzled out in March. The government of Ireland, Denmark, and Greece are all set to invite bids for licences by the start of next month and to make decisions in the third quarter.

But in Luxembourg, bids will not be invited until September, and licences will not be awarded until December - only days before the expiry of the European Union's somewhat optimistic year-end deadline for the start of the services themselves.

And in France, where two licences are due to be formally awarded at the end of this month to the only applicants which submitted bids in January, France Telecom's Orange and Vivendi's SFR, the contest for the remaining two licences will not be held until next spring, after the presidential and legislative elections.

These delays have been accompanied by further postponements in the projected start dates for the first W-CDMA services. Last month NTT DoCoMo announced that it would not after all launch the world's first commercial W-CDMA service on May 30, and had instead delayed the launch date to October 1. The next day, the Spanish government said it had put back its deadline for the start of W-CDMA services from August 1 to June 2002.

These moves have focused attention on the BT-owned Manx Telecom, which still says it will launch a service on the Isle of Man at the end of this month. But given that it will start with only a few hundred handsets, most of which will be distributed to selected users, it is debatable whether this service can really be called commercial.

Neil McCartney is editor-in-chief of Wireless Internet, www.mmwirelesinternet.com'