MSE News: EU 'ban' on mobile roaming fees WON'T stop firms charging some extra 2 May 2017 at 5:05PM edited 2 May 2017 at 5:09PM in Mobiles 17 replies 3.6K views

Former_MSE_Nick

UK mobile users travelling in the European Union could still face hefty additional fees of around £7.80/GB to use their data allowance – despite a much-touted EU 'ban' on roaming charges coming into effect this summer...

Read the full story:
'EU 'ban' on mobile roaming charges WON'T stop firms charging some extra fees for data'

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Frozen_up_north

We will have to wait approximately 2 weeks, the networks will mostly have to give their contract customers 30 days notice of the changes, by mid May the situation should be clearer.

Vodafone appear to currently be the only network to have moved, and part of that is to increase costs (to cover the "free" EU roaming?).

d123

MSE_Nick wrote: »

UK mobile users travelling in the European Union could still face hefty additional fees of around £7.80/GB to use their data allowance – despite a much-touted EU 'ban' on roaming charges coming into effect this summer...

Read the full story:
'EU 'ban' on mobile roaming charges WON'T stop firms charging some extra fees for data'

Click reply below to discuss. If you haven’t already, join the forum to reply. If you aren’t sure how it all works, read our New to Forum? Intro Guide.

Slightly slow at reporting there Nick.

This news came out in December 2016...

COMMISSION IMPLEMENTING REGULATION (EU) 2016/2286

of 15 December 2016

Under certain domestic tariff plans, described hereafter as open data bundles, the data consumption may be unlimited or may provide data volumes at a low implicit domestic unit price relative to the regulated maximum wholesale roaming charge referred to in Article 12 of Regulation (EU) No 531/2012. In the absence of any exceptional volume safeguard specific to such open data bundles, such tariff plans are more likely than other tariff plans to be subject to organised resale to persons not residing in or having stable links entailing frequent and substantial presence in the Member State of the roaming provider. Moreover, such anomalous or abusive use of open data bundles while roaming may lead to the disappearance of such tariff plans in domestic markets, or to the restriction of roaming with such tariff plans, to the detriment of domestic users, and contrary to the objective of Regulation (EU) No 531/2012. This risk is considerably less acute for voice calls and SMS services as such services are subject to greater physical or temporal constraints, and actual usage patterns have been stable or declining over the last years. This is without prejudice to the right of operators to take measures to tackle highly atypical use patterns of voice or SMS roaming services arising from fraudulent activities. While it is necessary to provide for additional safeguards against such increased risks of abusive usage of regulated retail roaming data services at the applicable domestic retail price under open data bundles, the domestic customer periodically travelling in the Union should nevertheless be able to consume retail volumes of such services equivalent to twice the volumes that can be bought at the wholesale roaming data cap by a monetary amount equal to the overall retail domestic price, excluding VAT, of the mobile services component of the domestic tariff plan for the entire billing period in question. This represents a volume that is consistent with that domestic tariff plan, as it adapts to the domestic retail price of the tariff plan in question, and may therefore be applied in the case of open data bundles, including when bundled with other mobile retail services. The application of a multiplier of two adequately reflects the fact that operators often negotiate wholesale data roaming prices below the applicable caps, and that customers often do not consume the entire data allowance provided under their tariff plan. In this regard, customer transparency will be assured through compliance with the provisions of Regulation (EU) No 531/2012, according to which the roaming provider shall send a notification to the roaming customer when the applicable fair use volume of regulated data roaming services is fully consumed, indicating the surcharge that will be applied to any additional consumption of regulated roaming data services by the roaming customer.

http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:32016R2286

agarnett

There have been so many false starts on the "news" that EU roaming would become free of surcharging i.e. included in normal monthly allowances, supposedly due to imminent changes to EU law, that we the masses gave up years ago on the politicians who were supposed to have implemented it (also years ago!).

The can has been kicked down the road so many times, unashamedly.

Even now, this close to the firmest deadline yet, throughout EU it is deliberately as clear as mud as to how it will settle - as with all things where major corporates have corrupt politicians by short and curlies.

Let's not kid ourselves, the telecoms giants have fingers in all the pies throughout the EU. They own it all, basically.

Until Three unilaterally closed down their £15pm All you can eat SIM deal, I used it a lot in EU, but with no tethering possible away from UK. For the last 18 months approx, I've been paying Three £12 per month for unlimited calls and texts plus 4GB data I can use in EU and many countries elsewhere too. I am away a great deal and I have exploited Three's special deals mercilessly. So much s that a few months ago I was one of some thousands of customers who one day actually received a text saying that roaming services had been closed down because we had been using them for more than 2 months cumulative in last 12 months! Their customer services didn't know about it, and on the basis that their company meant what it said, started quoting T&Cs - we're so sorry but no we cant reconnect you because you have indeed used Feel-Like-Home on over 60 days in the last year! The next day they said sorry but the texts were sent in error!

I suppose the congratulatory texts they sent throughout last year telling me how many tens of pounds I saved last month by using Feel-Like-Home, were also sent in error! One month I supposedly saved over two hundred quid

For the last 12 months I've also been spending another €14.65 pm (about £12 too) on a 360 minute / 40GB pm deal with another EU country provider - I use that in one particular country instead of landline broadband and because it is 4G I watch casted movies and tv on it. I am not sure how that one will work elsewhere in EU from June - they haven't told me yet, but I note they have just started selling a new contract with 600 minutes and 40GB for €20pm and that includes a cap of 6GB on roaming data, but no restriction on tethering that I can see yet.

Will be interesting to see what they (the EU provider) will do with my older style contract.

So we are not alone with the confused state of affairs, and my money is on the suggestion that roaming data caps will be the way they are all going - which as usual, really ain't what was touted years ago by the politicians ...:mad:

Pegase

Potentially far more expensive than a data cap is the charge on non-UK calls and texts.

I have seen no clear statement on this but right now, the caps meant whilst roaming if you call/text ANY phone, whether a UK, local or 3rd country, you pay the same (very low now) fee. with the removing of roaming, network are free to charge any call/text to non-UK phone as they would at home.. which is a LOT (overseas calls are often £1/min, especially to mobiles, overseas texts >£0.20) and never included.

agarnett

Not completely with you on that Pegase - when roaming in EU, currently any text to any EU mobile on my Three contract is 3.9p/min, 1.6p/text ?

Same sort of thing applies on my EU sourced other contract when I am roaming in UK for example, but the cost is a little more.

Am I missing the point you are making? Are you saying that those low local call and local text rates we have become used to in the last year or two when roaming in EU will when changes take effect in June, become fair game for increases back up to the ridiculous levels of a few years ago and beyond?

Can they do that? Do they take us all for fools?

agarnett

Had an update from my (other country) EU provider as to what changes they are making unilaterally to my contract from 15 June 2017 - they will apply a cap of 4GB on data use when I'm in an EU country but away from the contract home country, plus they will also increase the price of the contract by 9% :eek:

d123

agarnett wrote: »

Had an update from my (other country) EU provider as to what changes they are making unilaterally to my contract from 15 June 2017 - they will apply a cap of 4GB on data use when I'm in an EU country but away from the contract home country, plus they will also increase the price of the contract by 9% :eek:

What network is that?

Frozen_up_north

Pegase wrote: »

Potentially far more expensive than a data cap is the charge on non-UK calls and texts.

I have seen no clear statement on this but right now, the caps meant whilst roaming if you call/text ANY phone, whether a UK, local or 3rd country, you pay the same (very low now) fee. with the removing of roaming, network are free to charge any call/text to non-UK phone as they would at home.. which is a LOT (overseas calls are often £1/min, especially to mobiles, overseas texts >£0.20) and never included.

The last time I checked, both EE and Vodafone include EU landline and mobile numbers from your bundle while roaming EU countries (other than calling EU countries when in the UK).

Virgin have moved on EU roaming, but have a list of T&Cs so long I can't be bothered to read them, they don't include tethering either... neither do they let you use all your data allowance at full speed, throttling it after 3.5GB. Seems like they are a joke network.

frankst237

In all the discussions I have seen it has all been about contracts in the UK working (or not) overseas. What about PAYG customers?

What I mean is (for example) EE and Vodafone currently charge 30 to 35p PER MINUTE to make calls in the UK (on a standard PAYG credit basis excluding 'bundles' or 'packages'). Will these be the costs when making a call in the EU (30 to 35p) or is it restricted to something less (whatever the post 15th June number quoted by the EU regulation) - maybe 3-4 p????

I know that some networks (Three) currently charge 3p per minute for a call but what about the other members of the UK mobile industry charging 30p+ per minute for a call?

Ian011

frankst237 wrote: »

In all the discussions I have seen it has all been about contracts in the UK working (or not) overseas. What about PAYG customers?

What I mean is (for example) EE and Vodafone currently charge 30 to 35p PER MINUTE to make calls in the UK (on a standard PAYG credit basis excluding 'bundles' or 'packages'). Will these be the costs when making a call in the EU (30 to 35p) or is it restricted to something less (whatever the post 15th June number quoted by the EU regulation) - maybe 3-4 p????

I know that some networks (Three) currently charge 3p per minute for a call but what about the other members of the UK mobile industry charging 30p+ per minute for a call?

Yes. Under the new rules the costs for using those sorts of deals in the EU will be allowed to rise up to those sorts of levels, but whether providers will increase charges in that way is a whole other matter. In theory, competition should keep those costs down. In practice, it seems competition involves providers increasing their prices to whatever they think they can get away with and when one tests the water by increasing their prices all of the others follow shortly after.

However, more than ever this underlines the fact that anyone who is on a deal where their calls to ordinary landline numbers, 03 numbers and mobile numbers are charged at 35p to 55p per minute is very much on the wrong deal and is being ripped off by their phone provider. There are other providers charging 3p, 5p or 8p per minute for these calls.

Anyone spending more than £5 per month on calls charged at a per-minute rate and texts charged per-message should have bought an inclusive bundle which would give a far larger allowance.