We knew it was coming, we’ve been waiting for it to happen, and now it has. As from today, extortionate mobile calls across the European Union will start to become a thing of the past as tariffs are cut across the board.
No longer will it cost a small fortune to send a text message, make a call or access emails whilst travelling in the European Union as charges will now be reduced by up to 60 percent.
It was back in 2007 that the European Union first proposed the plans and now they have been approved by the European Parliament and the 27 member states of the European Union.
“All Europeans making calls or sending texts with their mobiles can experience the EU’s single market without borders. The roaming rip-off is now coming to an end,” EU Telecoms Commissioner Viviane Reding said in a statement.
Mobile phone operators who have cashed in on the rip off for years will now only be able to charge a maximum of 11 cents for a text message. Roaming calls will be capped at 43 cents a minute for making a call whilst abroad and receiving a call is capped at 19 cents. The prices are set to go down again on 1st July next year and on 1st July the year after.
Another criterion the operators have to meet is that they are now required to bill their customers by the second after 30 seconds when customers are making calls and charge them by the second from the first second for receiving calls abroad. This will stop operators from “rounding up” the charges which can see the cost of calls abroad rise significantly.
“I call on the mobile industry to pass these savings on to data roaming customers swiftly,” Reding said.
“The (European) Commission and national regulators will monitor data roaming charges very carefully and assess next year whether the roaming market is finally becoming competitive.”
WE know what it’s like when we return from a holiday or a business trip and find our mobile phone bill has shot through the roof, well the European Commission also wants to put a stop to what they refer to as “bill shock” by introducing a cut off when bills reach 50 euros.
Not everyone is pleased though; the GSM Association which represents mobile operators has said the latest measures by the European Commission are unnecessary as prices were already coming down.
Were they? If so I hadn’t noticed.
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