Watch your data usage abroad as allowances can vary

Dear Editor

From June 15th rules governing data on phone calls and sending text messages will cost the same, regardless of where in the European Union one is making them.

Consumers will be able to use the same phone and text allowances that one has at home or overseas without incurring penalties.

The European Commission said: “your communications ( phone calls, SMS, data) made from another EU country will be covered in your national bundle . . . Contrary to the past, you will not have to pay anything extra. No bill shock anymore.”

This is sounds great but is not quite right. As the data allowance available for EU roaming varies from package to package and the allowance may be lower than what consumers have here, the roaming data volume must be twice the volume obtained by dividing the price of the mobile bundle ( excluding VAT) by € 7.7.

So if one has a mobile bundle including unlimited calls, SMS and data for € 42 (€ 35 excluding 20% VAT), when travelling in the EU, one gets roaming fees like at home for unlimited calls and SMS, and at least 9.1 GB of data - double the result by dividing 35 by 7.7.

A fair usage policy means operators can limit the volume of certain customers’ domestic data allowance usable when EU roaming and impose hefty surcharges if it is breached.

The following scale of fees applies: 3.2 cents per minute of voice call, from 15 June 2017: 1 cent per SMS : a step by step reduction over five years for data caps, decreasing from € 7.7 per GB to € 6 per GB as of 1 January 2018, € 4.5 per GB as of 1 January 2019, € 3.5 per GB as of 1 January 2020, € 3 per GB as of 1 January 2021 and € 2.5 per GB as of 1 January 2022.

Consumers who watch 30 minutes of Netflix and a sim- ilar quantity of YouTube clips, five Facebook updates, 30 minutes of radio streaming and five tweets will rack up monthly data of 7.25 GB.

Roaming charges were abolished so holiday goers could avoid the “bill shock” when they arrive home.

Yours sincerely,

Gerry Coughlan, Kilnamanagh, Dublin 24.