News
BackDate:11 May 2012
EU to cut mobile roaming charges
The European Parliament has passed a bill to cut mobile phone roaming charges, including data charges incurred when using mobile internet services abroad. The latest round of cuts will see the cost of making a mobile phone call from another EU country reduce from about 30p a minute to 24p, while the cost of sending a text will drop to around 7p. The European Commission aims to ensure there is virtually no difference in the cost of domestic and foreign call rates by 2015. Overall, roaming costs have fallen by around 74% since the commission’s campaign began in 2007.
Europe's "Digital Agenda" Commissioner Neelie Kroes said: "By putting price caps on data we have created a roaming market for the smart phone generation. More than that, we have ended the rip-offs familiar to anyone who has used a mobile phone while travelling abroad.
"I am pleased that year after year the European Union is putting money back into the pockets of citizens."
From July consumers travelling in another EU country other than their own will pay no more than 29 euro cents per minute to make a call, 8 cents to receive a call, 9 cents to send a text message and 70 cents per megabyte to download data or brose the internet.