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The non-introduction of additional data roaming charges for Britons touring Europe was one of Brixit’s most symbolic promises. However, according to politico.eu, it has now been broken.
EE, the mobile operator of telecoms holding BT, became the first after Brexit to reintroduce additional roaming fees for new customers and renewers. This decision has raised a number of concerns that EE’s competitors will follow suit. To date, two other operators (Three and O2) have reported changes in mobile phone use when Brits travel to Europe.
The three mobile operators, along with Vodafone, promised in January not to renew roaming rates after Brexit.
Brits traveling in Europe have already gotten used to 2017. introduce rules for free roaming in the European Union (EU), which prohibit telecommunications companies from charging additional data roaming fees within the Union.
However, Brexit has withdrawn this guarantee from mobile device users in the UK. The EU-UK trade agreement encourages cooperation to ensure fair and clear data roaming rates, but does not prevent operators from introducing new rates for international calls and data usage.
According to experts, Brussels has prevented UK operators from staying in EU agreements that set out how much they have to pay other EU operators when UK customers use their mobile networks. This is believed to be because such an agreement is seen as one of the biggest advantages of the EU single market.
Other consumer protection rules, although derived from EU regulations but not related to EU membership, will continue to apply under UK law, including a £ 45 fee for mobile data abroad and a requirement to that mobile operators inform customers when they are 80% depleted. . and 100 percent. data in your possession.
However, EE customers can still receive significant bills. Starting next January, the company plans to introduce a rate of £ 2 per day for new customers who renew their plans after July 7 when traveling to 47 countries (this list includes all EU countries except Ireland).
Starting August 2, O2 will charge for each additional gigabyte of mobile data used in the EU beyond the 25-gigabyte cap at £ 3.50. Three UK said it plans to lower the limit of its free data browsing in the EU from 20 to 12 gigabytes. The last two companies say that these changes would affect only a small proportion of their customers.
A Vodafone UK spokesperson told the company: “There are currently no plans to reimburse roaming charges” to customers.
Rocio Concha, director of operations and consumer advocacy for Which UK, a consumer organization, said the UK government should set limits on roaming prices for its consumers in trade deal negotiations and resume discussions with Brussels on the topic.
“The UK and the EU must agree on roaming prices as soon as possible to prevent companies from eliminating the benefits of roaming that customers have become accustomed to and to ensure that the huge fees that consumers are not reimbursed. have faced each other in the past. ” Concha said.
And this year was a great opportunity to do so, as the EU is now reviewing its roaming rules before they expire in 2022. June 30
Maryant Fernandez Perez, Senior Digital Policy Officer at BEUC, a group of 46 consumer organizations across Europe, said: “This is a political decision, but we want the European Commission to adopt international agreements with third countries that guarantee low prices and, ideally, it would allow them to ‘surf at home’, which is the case in the single market, “he said.
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