When are you in the EU but not EU roaming?

Donna_Adcock

Well apparently, when you are on a boat, according to Tesco Mobile! Yes really..... you can be in a car, train, aeroplane, even a camel if you choose. However the minute you step onto a cruise ship in the EU - you are no longer in Europe and are charged for making calls from outside the EU.... whilst your data is also being gobbled up quicker than the Christmas Turkey at £5 per MB. When checking how charges are applied in advance, their website asks you to identify the country you are visiting..... loads of countries in the drop down, so I chose Spain. My error apparently was that I did not scroll down to locate the 'country' called 'Cruise ship'. £60 spent on one phone call of less than 3 minutes - background apps responsible for the rest. 
How is this ethical?

GrumpyDil

Are you sure you were connected to a Spanish provider rather than the ships inboard facility which is hideously expensive?

Basically we were on a cruise last year and could connect occasionally when only a short distance offshore but further out would connect to the cruise ships facility. 

Clive_Woody

Not ethical but if it's in the T&Cs then there's no escaping the charges. I recently switched to ID mobile and they were very clear that cruise ships were not included in EU roaming.

In future you may be able to cap your spend, check your T&Cs.

novoice

Regardless of your chosen network, the moment your phone connects with the Maritime network of the vessel you have boarded, you can watch your money sail away.

It's always advised to turn off your mobile data when on cruise ships and car ferries and to use the onboard WiFi only, then once disembarked turn back on to connect to the networks of the country you're visiting.

We made the same mistake many years ago between Italy and Greece, didn't realise until the bill dropped that checking a few emails cost us over £600!

DullGreyGuy

Whilst you may still be physically in the EU if you connect to the ships mast rather than a mast on land you'll be on the Maritime network not Spain or Italy (or whatever country you are adjacent to). Maritime network isnt part of EU roaming 

If you look at the tool on the Tesco website for working out call costs, cruise ships are listed as their own "country"

jimjames

You can say the same on the South coast of UK, I've connected to French mast for roaming when I've been on the beach. Whatever you connect to you need to make sure that you know which network it is. Unfortunately I don't think there's an option to set roaming to only be specific countries.

Neil49

Cruise ships connect to the Internet via satellites which are both expensive and reside outside of the EU.

Typically, if you are just a few miles off the coast where there are towns you can link up with the mainland networks (which should be displayed on your screen). If the coastline is barren then you are unlikely to get any land based link at all.

I don't think ethics come into it. 

sully1311

Donna_Adcock said:

Well apparently, when you are on a boat, according to Tesco Mobile! Yes really..... you can be in a car, train, aeroplane, even a camel if you choose. However the minute you step onto a cruise ship in the EU - you are no longer in Europe and are charged for making calls from outside the EU.... whilst your data is also being gobbled up quicker than the Christmas Turkey at £5 per MB. When checking how charges are applied in advance, their website asks you to identify the country you are visiting..... loads of countries in the drop down, so I chose Spain. My error apparently was that I did not scroll down to locate the 'country' called 'Cruise ship'. £60 spent on one phone call of less than 3 minutes - background apps responsible for the rest. 
How is this ethical?

I don't believe there is a single UK network that would act differently to what Tesco has done. 

garyttt

£60 !!! And I thought £2 a minute to receive calls was extortion on the ferry. Lucky I'm very unpopular and even the boss didn't call me while I was at sea, as I'd nodded off to sleep and didn't see the warning texts saying I was con-nected to ship's mobile until after I had disembarked 3 hours later. I set my account to zero out of contract charges anyway, so hopefully that prevents excess charges.

I do sometimes wonder if google with android is in cahoots with the mobile networks. Because phones out of the box are set up to use data automatically and in the background without your explicit consent. You have to shut them all down, stop background data usage, or even switch data off, all manually. The EU has made all this fuss about phone chargers. You know, what type of connector plug. How ridiculous is that really. It's not like people are daily swapping en mass between USB A, mini USB, Micro USB, and USB C. Most of us stick to one. And even if we do, we have it in our power (Pun not intended) to fix it ourselves - it's not rocket science, it's not something hidden or complicated.

But something like how android is configured as standard, on phones supplied as standard - when is the EU gonna force manufacturers to supply the phones set up to the best privacy and security settings as standard. So you don't have to disable pointless apps you don't want, don't use, and don't even know what they do. They're disabled or not even loaded as standard. And they're certainly not set to secretly use data in the background, as standard.

That is what bugs me most. The very stuff that we, the average consumer can't easily fix or change is rigged to fleece us like pickpockets. It takes ages, to go through a modern phone and all the app settings to set them to suit. It's not like android 13 even, truly allows you to change all settings en mass, if you think it does, be warned, it doesn't. It will leave certain key apps with their permissions unchanged. And not all of us have broadband even now. I only have paid for data, and I'm not unique. So unwanted apps are costing me if I don't nail them down tight. 

flaneurs_lobster

One switch in Settings - Use Mobile Data - Off. 

lohr500

As per Clive_Woody's suggestion, set a cap limit of £0 if your contract provides capping.

That's what we did last year whilst cruising Northern Europe with Fred Olsen.
We could connect to French, Danish, Norwegian and Swedish networks when close to shore taking advantage of our EU Roaming, but didn't incur any crazy charges whilst further offshore.