Mobile Roaming: Cheapest Calls When You're Abroad

1jim

buglawton wrote: »

Seems o2 have read my mind - they just introduced a Europe data roaming tariff of £2 for up to 25MB per day, apparently renewable within the day if the 25 MB is reached.

Ideal for smartphones then.

This will apply to Pay and Go users too - maybe enough reason to pop in an o2 SIM for the holiday?

Press release:
http://news.o2.co.uk/Press-Releases/O2-Travel-use-your-mobile-worry-free-when-abroad-37a.aspx

But I can find nothing on the o2 website yet.

That looks good,
Any idea what 25MB gets you these days? I'm currently with giffgaff on £10 goody bag so don't really think about data useage but it would be nice to use the iPhone when away

buglawton

On a smartphone 25 MB will cope with any practical amount of emails and web pages on one day (as images are compressed by the 3g operator). Perfect for tourism abroad.

OH has a GiffGaff phone (which does have a decent-ish pay as you data roaming in EU deal....) but now this is looking tired compared to the o2 £2 deal.

I will post something on the GG forum and see what reaction we get.

jnm21

Good find buglawton. Seems they have rushed this one to press - full details next Sunday & available from July.

jnm21

Anyone know more about this?

From 2014, you will even be able to choose a mobile carrier for roaming purposes, independently to your local carrier, without affecting the terms of the original phone contract and carriers will be required to notify you of this new choice available.

grumbler

jnm21 wrote: »

Anyone know more about this?

NFH wrote: »

There is a lot in the news today about the re-introduction of competition in the EU roaming market discussed above. The following article suggests that Apple and Google will take advantage of this and introduce their own roaming packages, particularly for data roaming.

PC Pro: Could Google and Apple launch EU roaming services?

The BBC have also published video footage of the discussions in the European Parliament today.

....................

Richard_T_

buglawton wrote: »

Seems o2 have read my mind - they just introduced a Europe data roaming tariff of £2 for up to 25MB per day, apparently renewable within the day if the 25 MB is reached.

Ideal for smartphones then.

This will apply to Pay and Go users too - maybe enough reason to pop in an o2 SIM for the holiday?

Press release:
http://news.o2.co.uk/Press-Releases/O2-Travel-use-your-mobile-worry-free-when-abroad-37a.aspx

But I can find nothing on the o2 website yet.

sounds simalar to the vodafone passpaort deal that i made use of on PAYg in the Netherlands last summer, £2.00 got you upto 25mb per day from midnight to midnight, this meant that i had plenty of allowance for e-mails ( with picture attachments) web browsing, google navigation ( google maps) and so on, the web browsing was done via opera mini ( that compresses the data ) and the pictures were compressed with reduce photo size to 640x480 which was good enough for emails.
if you can respond to texts via e-mail as its cheaper, and install an app such as Fon/easy wifi network to make the most out of wifi abroad, amd then use another VOIP app for voice calls when conected to wifi without the roaming costs

confused_roamer

Hi

Just wondering if anyone can help me - I recently bought a TravelTalk SIM as I'm travelling around Europe a lot. I was assured that the SIM is a UK (O2) mobile number and calls to it would be included in my wife's Vodaphone package.

My wife called me a number of times while I've been away and the calls were not taking from her minutes - they were charged at a pretty hefty rate and she got quite a large bill.

Can anyone explain this?

thanks in advance...

grumbler

Well, they say:

The SIM card originates in the UK. You will get a UK mobile number, starting with +4478221

I think your wife has to ask her network why she was charged.

ETA:
However, they say (surprise surprise):

Can I keep my UK mobile number?
No, unfortunately international number portability is not possible.

And they definitely lied about O2 because:

Can this SIM card be used in the UK?
Yes you can. Because it is a roaming SIM, it will roam between all the UK networks to give you the best coverage.

confused_roamer

I don't get it - I thought all +44 78.... numbers were UK mobile numbers?

How can it be an international number, and how is anyone to know?

Seems like a case that needs to be taken to Ofcom to me, does anyone know the technical details of this?

grumbler

confused_roamer wrote: »

I don't get it - I thought all +44 78.... numbers were UK mobile numbers?
How can it be an international number, and how is anyone to know?

Have a look at this thread:
T-mobile charging for calls to lyca mobile

Seems like a case that needs to be taken to Ofcom

Ha-ha. Ofcom is the author of this mess with numbers.

As I said, ask Vodafone first. What do they say? And what exactly the 'hefty rate' was? AFAIK T-mobile is the only network that has the list of 'excluded' numbers.
Then you can take it to Ofcom.