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Europe mostly ends mobile roaming fees from today
- T3RMINATED 9y agoWhy Europe ahead of US
- matteuan 9y agoUnfortunately, there is still one important limitation: we will keep the fees for the traffic from our home countries.
- danmaz74 9y ago> calling foreign numbers will cost more at home than when travelling abroad How so?
- wim 9y agoUnless your provider’s plan includes calling abroad at domestic rates, calling a foreign number from home will be more expensive than calling that same foreign number from another member state. It’s a rather absurd consequence of the fact that it was decided that any communication from the state your provider is in (calls, data usage, etc.) is not technically “roaming”, and therefore not part of the “Roam like at home” agreement. While this agreement is definitely a step in the right direction, a few exceptions like this might actually increase phone bills for a number of people who were previously on special EU plans with their provider, some of which are now being phased out. A couple of parties are calling for the EU parliament to address these issues, but I don't think it will be changed any time soon.
- danmaz74 9y agoSuppose I have an Italian SIM and pay x to call Italian numbers, and 2x to call French ones. If I go to France, with these rules, I think I'll still pay x to call Italian numbers, and 2x to call French ones?
- Symbiote 9y agoNo, while in France you'll pay x to call all EU numbers.
- matteuan 9y agoNo Symbiote, his assumption is correct. You will pay 2x for calling french numbers, but still x for calling italian numbers. I also tried these days (my operator activated this regulation last week). I went to Italy with the german card and I could call german numbers for free(that's in my contract) but I was spending more to call italian ones (2 cent btw).
- JoeCamel 9y agoNo, calling foreign numbers costs the same in both your country and abroad. And it's usually more expensive on mobile networks, but that doesn't have anything to do with roaming.
- matthewmacleod 9y agoI don't think that the price of foreign calls will be affected – everything is simply charged at the home plan rate. Calling e.g. a French number will cost the same regardless of whether I am in France or the UK.
- martinald 9y agoIncorrect. The regulation only applies when roaming. To take three UK for example: Calling Spain from the UK: 46p/min Calling Spain from France while roaming: inclusive in minutes allowance, otherwise 3p/min. I also checked Vodafone.de and it's the same thing - nearly €1/min if you're in Germany, or inclusive if you're roaming. It's a bit of a joke really. I don't know why the EU didn't think of this.
- matteuan 9y agoSome years ago happened a similar thing with SMS. For example within Italy they costed 15 cents, but between countries 13cents because of the EU regulation.
- matthewmacleod 9y agoAhah, I see. It's quite hard to see what's going on through the contract language!
- Symbiote 9y ago> It's a bit of a joke really. I don't know why the EU didn't think of this. It's not within their power to regulate these charges.
- wila 9y agoThat is correct. Calling from your own EU country to any other country within the EU is still costing extra. Technically it isn't roaming and the telcos happily charge you premium as it does not fall under that regulation. Many people will be confused by this bit.
- tpm 9y agoEU mostly regulates inter-state commerce, not internal markets in countries, that's the job for the local regulators.
- halloij 9y agoSo the cost incurred will be passed on to everyone in higher fees. eg people who never "roam" are going to be subsidising those people that do. A negative move spun as a positive... clever EU, clever.
- glebm 9y agoRoaming costs are price gouging, the associated costs of providing roaming are nowhere near.
- halloij 9y agoThere is still a cost. And that cost is going to be passed on to everyone whether you use it or not.
- vesinisa 9y agoThe abolishing of roaming charges also applies between operators. As the true technical cost for roaming is negligible there is really no passing of charges from those who use it to those who don't.
- ptaipale 9y agoIs this a recent change? I hadn't heard of such. So, e.g. Telia doesn't have to pay any roaming charge to WIND Hellas if a Telia customer from Sweden goes to Greece and connects that network? Previously I heard a cap of 7 € per gigabyte for data fees was regulated.
- samastur 9y agoCharge still is regulated to 7.7EUR per GB, but that is not its cost. Cost is indeed negligible as data is mostly transferred on exactly the same networks as the rest of Internet traffic in EU and nobody sane argues that you should pay 7 EUR for each GB you transfer. If I divide my monthly internet bill with the amount of data I transfer during it, then price of GB of data transfer is indeed close to nothing.
- billpg 9y agoCool, just as Brexit looks to be falling apart under its own incompetence.
- halloij 9y agoWhat a fantastic comment. Well thought out, and spot on! Well done you. Please tell us your opinions on Trump as well!
- billpg 9y agoThank you very much. I worked very hard on it.
- scottmf 9y agoYou won, get over it.
- sctb 9y agoIf you want to continue commenting on Hacker News it can't be like this. https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- stuaxo 9y agoWhether this gets reversed after Brexit remains to be seem. Given mobile phones behaviour it seems likely.
- blibble 9y agoI never saw why this interference in the free market was needed when it was making progress, and in some circumstances already provided solutions to the problem on Three I've had free roaming for years, at no additional cost, across the EU and a good chunk of the rest of the world http://www.three.co.uk/feel-at-home http://www.three.co.uk/feel-at-home
- tskaiser 9y agoiirc 3 introduced this service when it was announced that these regulations were underway.
- hav 9y agoCorrect. It's difficult to see if that was causation though, as Three had already had "Feel at home" in 2013 when discussions started in the EU about this legislation.
- vidarh 9y agoThe first steps towards this happened in 2005, with the first regulations passed in 2007. 2013 is just the last tightening after the providers once again dragged their feet enough to finally get the Commission to accept they wouldn't do it voluntarily.
- hav 9y agoAh, my bad! I was under the wrong impression then. Thanks for informing. :)
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- adders 9y agoThe Three changes came in response to this change in regulations. As a relatively new operator they have always hated roaming, as it has made them less then the established operators.
- mrweasel 9y agoYeah, the telcos have already found a way out. They simply remove EU roaming from their standard subscriptions and it now becomes an add-on. So if you want to use your phone in a different country during the holidays, you'll need an EU roaming subscription. The politicians once again failed to be sufficient precise in formulating a law that would produce the decided result. They should have added a clause that state that all subscriptions are to cover the entire EU.
- rsynnott 9y agoTelecoms in at least some countries are already having to back down on that due to regulator pressure.
- StavrosK 9y agoEverything fine in Greece too. In fact, I've been using this for free for a year+ because my telco decided to include it in my (high-price, 20 eur/mo) plan for free earlier than planned.
- rsynnott 9y agoOh, yeah, some telecoms have no interest in trying to get out of this, and have been doing some form of free roaming even before forced to. Ultimately, "we're not trying to screw you over" is a great marketing point; I'd say telecoms who try to resist will suffer in the marketplace.
- JoeCamel 9y agoWhich telcos and in which country? Everything seems fine here in Croatia.
- mrweasel 9y agoIn Denmark it seems that most are remove EU roaming. I don't think 3 is, but Telia and CBB (Telenor subsidiary) are. The CBB contract for example is adding 40DKK to the price, for EU coverage.
- rdl 9y agoWhat is the correct European SIM to buy for data/voice/etc. (prepaid)? Presumably best to get one from a country you don't actually visit much, so you're always roaming, and thus don't pay the home to foreign number charges?
- matteuan 9y agoThere is a limit of 4 months of roaming usage per year.
- dorian-graph 9y agoDo you have a source for that so I can read more into it?
- apexalpha 9y agoI think it's 60 days a year. So a 'normal' person going on vacation, traveling for work, visiting a city just across the border will have fee-less roaming. But you can't go to Romania, buy a SIM and use it here indefinitely.
- ClashTheBunny 9y agoYou have to go to Romania, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Bulgaria, and Poland get one each? Or just get six cards from different services?
- matteuan 9y agoIn that case you will call cheap only within the countries you listed. No roaming fees doesn't mean that calling between different countries will be cheaper.
- JoeCamel 9y agoThere is of course fair use policy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_roaming_regulations#Fair_use_policy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_roaming_regulat...
- danmaz74 9y agoIt was about time; it will also help a lot with short-term mobility around the EU.
- _miroz 9y agoI'm wondering why the regulation was necessary and why the free market forces didn't bring the prices or roaming down? What are the forces in telecom industry that kept the prices so high (assuming that the prices were higher then necessary)?
- panzer_wyrm 9y agoCartels/vendor lock in
- donquichotte 9y agoIndeed! Cartels charging outrageous prices like 0.5€/SMS (roaming) in 2017, that is more than 4000€ per megabyte. I have no idea how the telcos have been able to milk the public for that long. And for Switzerland, there is no end in sight.
- rsynnott 9y agoSome telecoms actually did reduce roaming prices long ago, but consumers aren't particularly willing to move between networks (still more difficult than it should be in most cases, and the telecoms like it that way; that's why they resisted software SIMs so vigorously), and plans are often complex and difficult to understand.
- gmac 9y agoBecause it's a confusopoly[1] and roaming charges (like data overage charges) weren't part of the headline offer, which was generally UNLIMITED calls and texts and a FREE phone when you pay £X per month. Same as 'free' banking in the UK, which is in reality heavily cross-subsidised by the poorest customers paying overdraft penalties. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confusopoly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confusopoly
- stuaxo 9y agoWhat a great term. Mobile companies are the obvious ones to do this. Energy companies use this to great effect - there is never a like-for-like to compare.
- endijs 9y agoThis idea was good. But in reality what happened in Latvia was very simple and expected move by telcos - all three of them raised prices for all subscriptions by about 3€-4€ monthly (which is ~30% increase). Yes, now you can feel better while traveling, however everyone now pays extra every single month. For some situation now is better, while others pay for it even if they do not need such freedom. Those who are in first category are happy, others not so much. Edited: It's interesting to see how comment which states facts, can get upvoted and downvoted this much. Sometimes voting in HN does not make any sense (to me). I understand that upvote is "thanks for letting us know those facts". What are downvotes representing? That I should not write at all, that price increase for all 3 telcos is fine, that everyone should be happy? Rhetorical question.
- Retric 9y agoIf roaming is free, can't you just use another countries cellphone provider? And if so, it's likely the cheapest country needed to raise rates should people from more expensive areas do so.
- matteuan 9y agoNo https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_roaming_regulations#Fair_use_policy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_roaming_regulat...
- jahnu 9y agoNo. There are various limits. One of which is you have a limited amount of time you can roam for per year before you have to start paying. It's not too bad though. The real shit loophole is that they don't give you your full data allowance when roaming. It's needlessly complicated of course. Very rough idea: if you get 10gb for €10 a month you can roam for free for 2gb of that.
- kungtotte 9y agoThe amount of roaming you get depends on your carrier and contract. We get up to 20 GB of roaming or your contract data cap, whichever is lowest. E.g. me and my wife can roam for 20 GB because our contract is for 24 GB, but if we had a 12 or 6 GB plan we could only get 12 or 6 respectively.
- k-mcgrady 9y agoFrom reading this thread it seems that telecoms companies and the EU need to make it much more clear what is actually happening. Half the people commenting here have one experience and the other half have the complete opposite. It's probably difficult to know how this will all shake out for a couple of years considering most of us are locked into multi-year contracts.
- InTempWeTrust 9y ago"Thats the way to have problem fixed, have it directly impact upon the live of your representative. Thus, good lobbyism is always to try to convert the selected Ones to ones vices and habbits."
- bane 9y agoDoes anybody know what this might mean for Phi users?
- timwaagh 9y agowell that's nice. at least i can call from belgium now when i will be there on saturaday. however if it is true that all the phone bills go up now then it is just a policy that lets poor workers subsidize rich travellers. that is an ethical problem. however we need to move on with european integration. the current system allows far too many loopholes for rich tax avoiders (who mostly move their money where tax is low) so any integration is a good one.
- unsigner 9y agoResult around here: roaming disappeared from all mobile plans except for the most expensive ones, which got nudged a few euros up. The frequent travellers (presumably wealthier) get subsidized by the infrequent travellers (presumably less wealthier).
- dx034 9y agoInfrequent travelers will also profit. If you're from Northern Europe going to Spain for vacation you now don't have to change money, don't have any border checks and can use your phone like at home. Using Facebook, Instagram & Co on holiday is important to many and will make people feel more "at home" in another EU country. This was never supposed to save money, it was to bring the EU closer together and make borders disappear further. Business travelers had fees paid by their employer anyway, not that much changed for them.
- eXpl0it3r 9y agoHere in Switzerland we have some of the highest mobile prices ($30+) [1], yet our mobile providers will not remove the fee like the rest or Europe. Our politician try to enforce every single new EU-law, but when there's once something that would benefit the people, they come up with many excuses why this couldn't be applied and how Switzerland isn't part of the EU and doesn't have to follow through... [1] https://www.swisscom.ch/en/residential/mobile/subscription-tariffs.html https://www.swisscom.ch/en/residential/mobile/subscription-t...
- tribaal 9y agoThat's because Swisscom is very good at lobbying, especially when that means they get to sit on their ass and collect free money for longer.
- geoka9 9y agoAmazing, $30 is considered high for a mobile plan. In Canada it's the price of the lowest end plan from the lowest end provider. A plan from a big name provider will be at least $60 with capped data.
- tigroferoce 9y agoIn Italy I pay $10 for 15gb per month with unlimited calls. Looking forward to go abroad :-)
- eXpl0it3r 9y agoIs that USD or CAD? $30 is also among the lower prices you have to pay for a plan in Switzerland. But it's kind of hard to define, since there many variables (data speed, data cap, phone call prices, coverage, etc). Most people I know are running on $60 to $100 plans. I'm looking forward to when my company is paying my mobile bill.
- ilyagr 9y agoMy guess is that people calling you also have to pay high prices per minute, as is common in Europe. So, the price doesn't include incoming calls. Not sure whether Canada world like US or like Europe.
- simion314 9y agoI am wondering how much extra cost the operators for a roaming call, in both case A where both phones are on same operator and in second case where second person is on a second operator.
- dx034 9y agoI'd guess that there's no extra cost for an operator like Vodafone if they have a roaming client using data. Mobile data will not go back to the home country and peering costs are similar throughout Europe. Phone calls have to be routed to the home country but that's not a significant cost item.
- mstade 9y agoThis is great, now I can ditch my UK Three SIM that I've had for years simply because they implemented a "feel at home" kind of policy long ago, where roaming within the EU is free. There was always a data limit, and you can't tether your phone to your laptop which was annoying, but it's been great for me who's been travelling in the EU frequently. Now I can drop that extra £30/month cost and don't have to carry extra SIMs. I love it.
- Angostura 9y agoAs far as I know, the data limit is whatever your tariff normally gives you - no more, no less. I wouldn't be surprised if the other carriers have a no-tethering-while-roaming rule too.
- nikon 9y agoEE are good with tethering and roaming speeds.
- rolodato 9y agoDo you think it's likely it'll stay that way after Brexit?
- m_t 9y agoRegarding Three, one of the telco available in the UK, as the parent said they were already aligned with this proposition with their "Feel at home" option. Since it covers the EU and many other non EU countries (USA included for instance) I think it'll stay this way.
- ZeroGravitas 9y agoThe 3 Feel at Home offer was (and is, for non-EU destinations) an extra, paid add-on to the basic "essentials" service. You also get tethering on that higher price plan, so maybe the average HN user wouldn't consider the lower tier and just counts it as 'free' from their perspective.
- rekshaw 9y agoA lot of people complaining here. I am based in Luxembourg currently, and went to London last week. The peace of mind of landing in a foreign city and being able to use your phone as if at home truly is incredible. I could really feel the barriers to traveling fading. (Ironic that it was London, I know). BTW, my Luxembourghish telco actually aligned with the EU directive ahead of time (June 1st).
- mullen 9y agoAs an American who likes to travel to Europe, this is a godsend. I can buy a pre-paid SIM before I leave America and then use it all over Europe. Getting a TIM (Italy, 35 Euro for one month) SIM was a real pain in the ass and I would love to have found somewhere else to make the process much easier and cheaper.
- dheera 9y agoAgreed. I now use Google Fi (free roaming in 150 countries) but that didn't use to exist. When I was doing an internship in Switzerland about 9 years ago I often travelled to nearby countries on weekends and internet access was always a problem. Free Wi-Fi was largely nonexistent back then, and roaming charges were upwards of USD15 per megabyte (yes, mega). Simply trying to use Google Maps to get to a hostel might cost more than the cost of staying at the hostel. And being on a prepaid plan, there was always the risk of accidentally clicking on an ad and burning up all of the quota that I purchased, leaving me stranded without internet access. I relied mostly on printed paper maps that summer. I always thought it made zero sense in a part of the world where crossing country borders could be an everyday occurrence especially if you live close to a border. I also thought it made absolutely zero sense that the various Oranges and various T-Mobiles of different countries don't have free roaming plans with each other. Why didn't Orange UK, Orange France, Orange Switzerland, Orange Egypt, Orange Romania, etc. work together to give free calls and free internet access on each others' networks, routing everything over IP? They could have won over a bunch of business customers by doing that and killed some competitors.
- WillyOnWheels 9y agoPrepaid wireless plans in America are marketed as being cheaper than long term contracts. San Francisco tacks on a 23 percent fee to prepaid wireless plans. http://www.prepaidphonenews.com/2016/03/california-boe-releases-new-prepaid.html http://www.prepaidphonenews.com/2016/03/california-boe-relea...
- dx034 9y agoYou should move to a more densely populated country ;)
- Radim 9y agoAh! Central regulations brought us inefficient telco monopolies and cartels. Surely some more central regulations will remedy the situation! "To each according to his needs." What could possibly go wrong?
- Brakenshire 9y agoWell, the reason why there is so much telco competition in Europe, and the prices are so low, is that the EU set common standards for mobile phone protocols from the start. Each company cannot keep its customers from going to the competition, I have been able to buy one phone which works with every company everywhere in the continent for decades. Everyone I know buys a phone (often second hand) then moves from one company to another to get the best deal. The problem with the US is not regulation, it is bad regulation.
- Radim 9y ago"If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it." Pray, Mr. Babbage, what is the "true value" of roaming? How much profit shall we decree suitable, for private corporations? And why stop at telcos?
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- Shalle135 9y agoMoving more freely in EU why are people against that? Sure LT, LV, Poland, Romania etc probably got a slight raise. At the same time these countries are heavily subsidized by the rest of the countries already. What they also have is alot of people working abroad… so then they are allowed to surf with their cheap plans in not so cheap countries. I can also note that this law has resulted in alot more unlimited plans. I myself have just gotten one which includes 30gb of roaming. Is it cheaper than before? Hell no. Do I have to care about how much I surf, when or where? Not anymore - and freedom is worth the extra €20.
- tdeck 9y agoAs an American I was shocked at how cheap cell phone plans already are in Europe. You can get a great 4GB data SIM for like 10 euros, where it would easily be several times that in the US. My Verizon unlimited plan is $86/month per person, and even that is a special thing that's grandfathered in.
- Sami_Lehtinen 9y agoUnlimited 50 Mbit/s is 17,90€/mo and 100 Mbit/s is 24,90€/mo. Of course with unlimited full speed tethering. I found it utterly ridiculous that in US tethering is limited or there are transfer limits. Users easily use 30, 50 or 100 Gbytes / mo. Low limits make torrenting and snapschat, music streaming, Youtube and Snapshat really annoying to use. In Finland average users uses over 10 Gbytes/mo. You can guess what kind of amounts the top 20% transfers based on Pareto principle. I usually recommend people to buy only one mobile Internet connection. It doesn't make any sense for "normal users" to buy anything else. 100 or 300 Mbit/s mobile, that's it. Yet 300 Mbit/s mobile is pretty expensive, 29,90€/mo (including tax and fees).
- untog 9y agoIt's not so bad if you shop around. T-Mobile has a PAYG SIM card that is $30/month for 5GB of data, unlimited texts and 100 minutes of calls. I suspect part of the difference in price is due to geography - the US has vast, vast areas of unpopulated land that people still want to receive cell coverage in. Europe has less of that. It would be interesting to see the customer response to a new US network that I'd cheaper but only covers major metro areas.
- WillyOnWheels 9y agofor people like me who don't understand how the fees work http://prepaid-data-sim-card.wikia.com/wiki/European_Union http://prepaid-data-sim-card.wikia.com/wiki/European_Union
- bajsejohannes 9y agoThe article lists the 28 EU countries, but note that this is true for the countries of the European Economic Area too: Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.
- Markoff 9y agothis is all nice and dandy but it's still only half job, since this doesn't mean there are no charges for international calls so yes receiving calls or using internet will be same as home, you still have to watch what number you are calling, if it's from country of your carrier or different please correct me if I am wrong EDIT: so I was right, now it's even more insane than before: For example: If you have a Belgian card and you travel to France and call either a hotel in France, back home to Belgium, or to any other country in the EU and the EEA, you are roaming (refer to legal text on the regulation on roaming) , and you will pay Belgian internal domestic prices (refer to legal text). However, if a Belgian SIM card holder calls from Belgium to Spain, she/he will pay the international tariff. Calls from home to another EU country are not roaming and are not regulated. source: https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/faq/frequently-asked-questions-roam-home https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/faq/frequently... TLDR: there are no fees for international calls while you are in roaming, but when you return back home enjoy fees for international calls, using your SIM in foreign network is cheaper than using it in your own network at home
- throwaway-1209 9y agoAs a TMobile customer in the US, tongue in cheek question: what's a "roaming fee"? It's kinda cool when your phone just works worldwide. That's the way it ought to be, imo.
- codecamper 9y agoI wonder if prepay will work with same rates while roaming. I'm in Italy now with 20GB of data from TIM... I'd like to continue using it in Slovenia, but somehow I'm doubting this will work.