Daily Management Review

EU says goodbye to mobile roaming charges


06/14/2017


Starting from tomorrow, the EU cancels the roaming charges for subscribers of European mobile communications companies. This is stated in a message of the Council of the European Union.



"The EU brings people together and makes their life easier. The end of the roaming charges is a true European success story. Now, citizens who travel within the EU will be able to call, write and communicate via mobile devices at the same price as at home. Eliminating roaming fees is one of the biggest and most tangible successes of the EU". 

Since Thursday, EU residents who travel within the EU will be able to call, send sms messages and connect to the Internet from their mobile devices at the same prices that they pay at home. However, there are also some nuances. The new rules are valid only for short trips within the EU. That is, if a client lives in one European country, and he has a contract for mobile communication services in another, he should not count on "free" roaming in this case.

In order to avoid abuses, operators are advised to check how subscribers use communication abroad, paying attention to such moments as insignificant use of communication in the "native" market with significant amounts of roaming; long periods of inactivity, which are replaced by t use of the card mainly in roaming; consecutive use of several sim cards by one consumer in roaming and other signals. In case of abuse, the operator must notify the user. After that, the company will be able to charge a small extra fee for roaming charges from the offender.

The cost of mobile services in the European Union differs significantly from country to country. For example, subscribers in Ireland pay for voice calls six times more than Latvian customers of telecoms do.

New roaming rules apply to 28 EU countries, including Great Britain, and three countries of the European economic space - Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein. Citizens of Switzerland will continue to pay for roaming, in addition, some operators in Andorra, Monaco, San Marino and the Vatican will also continue to work under the old scheme. Some European operators decided not wait until Thursday, and have already provided free roaming within the EU.

The debate about too expensive roaming in the European Union began in 2004. EU citizens received huge phone bills after traveling to neighboring countries of the union. In 2007, the first regulatory law was adopted, which reduced roaming tariffs by 60%.

source: bbc.com