Residents of the European Union no longer have to pay roaming fees when traveling to another EU member country… with a few exceptions.
As promised, the EU has adopted new “Roam Like at Home” rules that let travelers pay the same prices for talk, text, and data that they would if they were using their phone in the home country.
Carriers can still charge you fees if you go over a data limit, but the fees are capped at a much lower rate than they used to be. And if you spend more time abroad than you do in our home country over a 4-month period, you carrier may charge you extra.
Some budget wireless carriers also have permission to charge a small amount in roaming fees.
Note that the new rules do not apply to travelers visiting an EU member country from a non-member nation. So, depending on your wireless carrier, you may still be better off buying a new SIM card when traveling from the US to Europe.
Travelers from the United Kingdom can still benefit… at least until Brexit is complete. Overall, the new Roam Like at Home rules affect residents of 28 countries.
I live in France and I’ll try all that in Madeira this summer.:)
Yep, just in time for Brexit…
FYI: Three Mobile, one of the biggest wireless networks in the UK have already stated that those roaming charges will not be returning after Brexit happens. The rest have declined to comment on the matter. Also, given that roaming was a profit center for mobile companies, it’s likely the will attempt to recoup those lost profits by raising prices elsewhere.
Overall, though, this is good news for an increasingly mobile population.
More interesting, Canada bans cellphone unlocking fees, orders all new devices be unlocked
https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/crtc-wireless-code-cellphone-1.4161711
This will also encourage retailers to better compete and should have a negative impact on carrier bloat and delayed software updates. Wish more regulators would do their jobs, at least every so often.
Also valid for Norway and Iceland, (but not Switzerland, they have a different treaty with the EU).