MSE News: UK texts cost more than EU roaming caps

hermante

MSE_Helen_(from_the_article) wrote:

MoneySavingExpert.com creator Martin Lewis says: "This is a farcical anomaly. EU regulations protect text costs when people go on holiday, but don't when people are at home.

That's how the EU works. Sorry if offtopic, but in the same way, a non-EU citizen (e.g. American) who marries a British citizen today would eventually have paid upwards of £3000 to the Home Office over a number of years in order to live in the UK. But if they married another EU citizen instead, the visas will be free. That's why all the sham marriages in the news involve EU nationals.

So obviously the solution here is to get a SIM from France or something.

ScarletBea

Yes, I noticed that last month during my holidays, and it works for texts abroad too.
It was cheaper to send a text with a UK phone from Sweden to Portugal than texting in the UK to Portugal.

drbesty wrote: »

If you have a mobile contract it will come with a text bundle, I can't think of a contract that comes with no texts

hehehe please don't generalise.
What you pay a month in a contract I top up in a year...

KTM_Gordo

drbesty wrote: »

The cost of sending texts has plummeted in the past few years, sending texts has never been cheaper

When I got my first Orange phone in 1995, text messaging was £2 a month for unlimited texts...

But for the case in point, I think the EU legislation is the problem - surely it would make more sense to say that you should not be charged more to send a text when roaming in the EU than it does at home (although whether it's inclusive / exclusive of your bundled texts is another issue).

We can choose our mobile phone provider based on their charges, which is how a free-market economy should work.

guesswho2000

I did notice this quite a while ago, but since my texts have been unlimited in the UK for years it doesn't really apply.

I'd like to be able to get an inclusive bundle for abroad though, my old O2 contract used to use 4 inclusive to send one inclusive while roaming, which was ideal.

Buzby

When Orance launched (in 1993-4) ALL texts were 'free' it was the first true 'digital dividend' Sadly, they realised they could make people pay for it as an extra, and this saw the ending of radiopaging as a viable alternative. I have to say, I usually use the networks own 'free text' service on their websites.

Hammyman

MSE_Helen wrote: »

This is the discussion thread for the following MSE News Story:

"It can cost more to send a text to someone a few metres away in the UK than over hundreds of miles when in Europe ..."

Stupid comment. The distance is irrelevant. It doesn't matter.

Do you write for the Daily Mail? They print this kind of rubbish.

2sides2everystory

I'd like to be able to get an inclusive bundle for abroad though

Yes and indeed many moons before there was O2 4for1, lo I can say unto you that verily there even was no distinction between abroad texts and UK texts.

Meantime, have you tried Fishtext? I use it all the time and have done since soon after they featured on BBC Click. Maybe Vyke is also worth a look but Fishtext works out cheaper to many countries.

With Fishtext some countries are up to 5p per text (Vyke I think is 6p?) but many destinations I send to are only 1.3p. Abroad to UK is 2p. There is a tiny data charge too but using the Java version of Fishtext I have found this to be insignificant even when roaming.

PS Hammyman, are you having a worse day than usual? I have long thought it very odd that EU capped the roaming SMS cost but not the home network cost, and that the cap was less than the PAYG rates on home networks. What's stupid about saying so??

drbesty

ScarletBea wrote: »

Yes, I noticed that last month during my holidays, and it works for texts abroad too.
It was cheaper to send a text with a UK phone from Sweden to Portugal than texting in the UK to Portugal.



hehehe please don't generalise.
What you pay a month in a contract I top up in a year...

My contract costs £7.50 a month, and they gave me a free Desire S which I managed to sell for £270, so my contract costs me -£45 a year, does your mobile company pay you to be a customer?

tacotaco

The article compares UK->UK and EU->UK. What about UK->EU? I assume that this isn't considered roaming and so the cap doesn't apply, and it costs more to text EU from the UK than within UK.

Getting a French SIM as in post 12 for use in the UK would be a partial solution - your UK mates won't be able to cheaply text you back. A dual-SIM phone would help.