just saw this. Roaming charges back in europe. Another comedy "brexit won't change anything" reality check:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-57595913
So much for normalising all EU laws.
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just saw this. Roaming charges back in europe. Another comedy "brexit won't change anything" reality check:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-57595913
So much for normalising all EU laws.
Only for EE, will see if anyone else follows along. Not that it bothers me, can't remember the last time I went abroad.
It bothers me greatly - I'm frequently abroad for work. I expect they will all follow because.. they can, and will charge extra for some kind of bolt-on.
Not sure, O2 have already introduced fair use policy of 25GB of data but wont be adding charges and Three were one of the leaders to bundle in free EU minutes etc. Not sure about the others
as the article, o2 reviewed doing similar, but have only introduced a data cap (for now)
It's worth noting EE is now part of the BT group. My recollection of being a BT customer is not a happy one so I'm not surprised they're doing this. Mergers not affecting customers, yeah right.
Virgin will likely be straight in with charges too
Doesn't affect me, as I don't plan on roaming to the EU, with or without a phone.
My provider has no roaming charges in over 200 countries. I've yet to go somewhere and not have coverage. This includes Kazakhstan (Best 'stan), Pakistan (Average 'stan) and Afghanistan (Worst 'stan).
Also, interesting to see a Brexit comment, in the wake of the EU's vaccine debacle. I didn't think there were any remoaners left...
Funny how EE in January promised it wouldn't do it. Wonder if Trading Standards can get involved for deceptive marketing?
I'll not repeat the term, but a lot more regretfuls went over to that side when word came that everyone else was getting more GPUs than the UK, that despite Covid all the cool tech in Germany would still be shipped everywhere in the world except the UK, and now stuff like this.
This is great news!!
...I mean, for the sharedholders obviously, not me & you.
The issue is EE basically lied earlier in the year saying they were not going to do it. They implicitly said in January,no roaming charges.
O2 is OK as they have a cap,so technically have not lied and you pay roaming over that data cap. Three also has just reduced the cap. Both vary between 12~20GB so should be enough for most users.
So EE could potentially get taken to court for false marketing, as they are the only one of the three who have basically not done this. Companies shouldn't make promises they can't keep and its quite clear EE was engaged in deceptive marketing to keep customers. This happened after we fully left.
The bigger problem is not Brexit,but more EE has told porkies after we left.
And before this thread goes off on a tangent, regardless of views of Brexit, remaining or leaving, lets just leave that where it belongs, in the past. While any decision to leave will ultimately affect future decisions for companies and indeed the country going over old ground won't help anyone and we don't want another thread closed because of it.
Thank you
This. I should not have used the word.
But there is point, that one of the downsides of the EU was the excessive bureaucracy, and the EU's disastrous vaccine rollout was of their own making. We should have dodged that bullet, but the refusal of Government to admit their mistakes means the UK has missed another opportunity. It's hard to do worse, but the current Government appears to be trying.
Unfortunately I think in all situations like this because of such divisive opinions on both sides as soon as brexit or even things related to it come into play the conversation will quickly escalate to a point where the original subject is lost. And we have a pretty good bunch of people on here, debate is good but some debate just breeds negativity. Lets keep it positive and on subject.
Well as positive as your phone charges going up can be :)
Also, I'm in Oxford on Saturday. Anyone for a pint? I'm buying!
I wouldn't disagree with that, but my point wasn't about Brexit. Or at least, at most, partially and indirectly.
I was really saying .... doesn't affect me. The full background to that is :-
1) Doesn't affect me 'cos .... not an EE customer.
2) Doesn't affect me 'cos .... my mobile phone costs are utterly minimal, 'cos my usage is. See note.
3) Doesn't affect me cos .... even if I physically went to an EU country, it's extremely unlikely I'd take my phone, or power it up if I did.
4) Doesn't affect me cos .... for reasons nothing to do with Brexit, I'm highly unlikely to be in an EU country.
5) Doesn't affect me 'cos .... and this is the partially Brexit bit, even if 4) wasn't already the case, for Brexit reasons I'm not likely to go to an EU country anyway. But 4) is the case, and it's unlikely in the extreme that my view on Brexit would have any effect.
Note - By "minimal" use, I mean almost zero. I have a Vodafone plan which costs me £0.00p per day, PAYG, and £1/day for some data, all calls and all texts, during that day., if and only if I use the phone for something chargeable. Which is rare. In the last year, I've activated that I think 5 times, at least two of which were to prevent the plan lapsing. I had my previous (non-smart) phone for about £10 years and the total call and text cost over that period was about £5.
When I say "minimal" use, I really mean it. I do use it a fair bit on Signal ( on wifi), to control some Alexa lights, and as a camera, but very rarely indeed for actual calls or texts. My entire lifetime data costs are £0.00. It's done 0.02MB in total, which was when I activated data for, literally, about 2 seconds, having already made a 6-monthly brief call to avoid losing the plan, just to make sure data worked.
Nothing any mobile company does, roaming or otherwise, will affect me by enough for me to really care.
At least, until now. My data usage might go up a bit soon because my new DJI drone uses GPS and mapping for "go home". I'm still looking to see if I can pre-load enough data on wifi for the maps of wherever I will be, or I might need to change plan to get the data for the drone controller. Dunno yet. But even then, roaming in the EU is extremely unlikely to make any difference regardless of my Brexit view. I really wasn't making a Brexit point.
I have a 100GB plan with Three and over the last year my data use hasn't been more than 40MB per month
I don't really have a yardstick to measure what my data usage might be if I need it for that mapping. I wouldn't think it'd be huge. What I like about the Vodafone plan is that unless I use it, cost per day (or per month) is zero, other than having to activate it at £1/time, every six months.
I'm not much of a mobile user, and have no need (or desire) to be. It's getting hard to avoid having one these days, but it's almost all about wifi use with me, and a very small set of people that have my mobile number to call me. I really don't want to be at everyone's back and call by mobile. Plus, when so few people legitimately call it, it makes it much easier to spot spammers/scammers instantly. I treat a mobile phone as a necessary nuisance, not something I desire to have. I doubt my view on that will ever change. It's just increasingly hard to entirely do without one.
They haven't technically lied, they used some weasel words. They had "no current plans" to reintroduce roaming charges in January. Clearly since then plans have been made.
Incidently the other networks used very similar wording, so expect them to follow suit once EE have taken all the bad publicity for it.
Quite so. I have "no current plans" to go out with a camera this weekend, but it doesn't mean I won't. I might plan it tomorrow. Or not.
As for the other networks, very possibly. Re: roaming, that won't affect me any more than EE does. But I take the point. I guess it'll depend on the reaction to EE. If other networks pick up lota of ex-EE customers as a result of this, they might welldecide that following suit isn't a a good idea. It might even force EE to about-face.
It feels like we spent years slowly making progress towards consumer friendly phone contracts, with it taking so long for phone providers to get over the hump of allowing properly unlimited data and tethering. I was grandfathered into a contract for something like 8 years with Three, because all the subsequent tariffs after they stopped proper All You Can Eat data came with fair usage data caps and prevented tethering. I don't mind paying a bit more per month so I know for certain that wherever I go with signal I have an internet connection I don't have to worry about running out of data on. It was only when Three were forced to axe their caps that modern contracts could compete: https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.ph...ile-plans.html
I wonder if, without EU pressure, we'll see a gradual slip back to the days of nickel and diming customers for using mobile internet as well as undoing all the progress with roaming.
Bit short notice, an hour and a half on the train (less if driving but then it's a long drive to just have a half so I can drive home).
Would be nice to meet some people though.
Back on topic, I'm with Three who allowed EU roaming before there was any legislation so I expect they will stick with it.
This was one of the brexit things which was inevitable, although some (like Vodafone who charge a fortune for their plans) might decide to make it a differentiating factor.
For me, I saw it was something like £2 a day to use your plan. Now I can really imagine if you take a family of 4 over and you all want to use all your plan all the time for a week, it's gonna get more expensive. But as a family you moderate that and work around it quite easily by... er... not doing that. I've found wifi is just fine to use if I need data access abroad and so on. Generally, the costs of travelling abroad are significant enough that £14 for a week (if I must) just doesn't factor into the decision. And when I was a kid, we didn't have mobile phones and somehow we survived on holiday.
Honestly, this is pretty minor and I think a couple of quid to use your free minutes and data in another country is actually pretty good.
There are far more important things lost through brexit and far more important compromises made. Although I do think overall the vaccine thing has demonstrated there are significant advantages to be had. But, as said above - these arguments belong in the past. It's done and we need to work on optimising the result.
As long as the charges are open, transparent and well-publicised, I don't have a problem. If you need the service and the cost is acceptable use it, and if you don't or it isn't, don't use it.
I used to get a cheap US SIM on arrival. I guess the same trick would help cover the issue, if not solve it all. But as long as users are aware, you pays yer money (or not) and takes yer choice, I guess.