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I can see this working well for EU countries but can fully understand why American carriers still charge insane fees. Although, I travel a lot as a Verizon Wireless customer and have seen a great drop in what they charge me to roam. Most recently:

$5 a day flat rate in Bermuda w/ my data allowance just being what it is normally (4GB a month)
$2 a day in Canada every 24 hours same rules apply.

Back in the day, I'd have to pay $10 for 50 megabytes or something like that. It was ridiculous.

If you are on the new Verizon Plan, Mexico and Canada are included in your plan now. No more $2 a day. (12GB+ plan)
 
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Im with Three UK and they already do this to certain countries (growing list) i went to Prague in September, and upon arrival got my welcome text and calls, texts and data came out of my allowance which includes totally unlimited data. I was still able to teher my macbook and that came from the allowance as well, so no nasty surprises, all for only £15 a month.
Once Brexit happens, I wonder if this Home Roaming will still work for the brits.
 
I think he was referring to it being the functional equivalent, in terms of how cell phone plans work.


Maby, but than You cant say that it is the same as in US walking between different states. In Germany, Poland and all other countries You can already talk in different states of Your country for the same contract.
 
For Americans who are complaining, we already have this in the US, it's the same as walking between states and using your phone normally...and in some cases with some carriers, that include Canada and Mexico as well.
The EU covers a lot more countries than the US, Mexico and Canada (not necessarily geographically)
 
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Once Brexit happens, I wonder if this Home Roaming will still work for the brits.
It shouldn't be affected, the roaming offered by Three covers a lot of countries which are not in the EU.

Screen Shot 2016-12-08 at 18.16.08.png
 
Still don't understand how American carriers do the ass-backwards move of charging for data with unlimited texts, while every other country in the world does practically unlimited data and charges per text. Who's correct?
Sorry but where does this information come from. Contracts in Europe includes a set amount of data and above that you are charged. You are much more likely to get a contract with unlimited text than unlimited data. A few carriers offer contracts with unlimited data but they are throttled.
 
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The EU covers a lot more countries than the US, Mexico and Canada (not necessarily geographically)
Again, I think the person who made the point is talking about the amount of GEOGRAPHIC AREA COVERED, not the actual number of countries/states/cities/whatever...
 
Once Brexit happens, I wonder if this Home Roaming will still work for the brits.
Then people in the UK can switch to Three as others have said, for £18/month.

List of countries where you don't pay any roaming charges are :

Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Channel Islands (Guernsey & Jersey), Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Gibraltar, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Iceland, Isle of Man, Indonesia, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macau, Malta, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Ireland, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland and USA.

EDIT: Got there before me Ollyw
 
In the U.S., T-Mobile offers free roaming to many countries around the world and they have unlimited data as well.
 
Still don't understand how American carriers do the ass-backwards move of charging for data with unlimited texts, while every other country in the world does practically unlimited data and charges per text. Who's correct?

What country has unlimited data and charges for texts?
 
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European Commission members met on Wednesday to discuss draft rules intended to eliminate roaming charges in the European Union as of June 15, 2017.

iphone-roaming.jpg

(Image: TapSmart)

The Commission said it is determined to put an end to roaming charges commonly billed by carriers when a customer calls, sends messages, or uses data on their mobile device while abroad in the European Union, outside of their primary country of residence, subject to proportionate checks for abusive usage.

European regulators have proposed a "Roam like at Home" solution that would allow travelers to call, text, and browse the web on their mobile devices when abroad in the European Union for no extra charge than the price they pay at home. It is not intended to be used for permanent roaming.

"Roam like at Home" is aimed at people who travel in the European Union for work or leisure. "They spend more time at home than they do abroad, and they make most of their calls, texts and use data in their home country," the Commission explained.The latest draft further clarifies consumer rights, such as ensuring that customers abusing a carrier's roaming policy are not subject to over-intrusive background checks and establishing a minimum alert period of 14 days before roaming charges can be imposed on customers who exceed fair usage.

The revised rules also introduce safeguards to ensure carriers remain competitive. Customers can be asked to prove they live or have "stable links" to a specific country before "Roam like at Home" is included in their contract, while those roaming excessively can be sent a warning message and/or small roaming charge.The proposed surcharges for customers who exceed fair usage are EUR0.04/minute per call, EUR0.01 per SMS, and EUR0.0085 per MB of data usage.

The draft legislation has now been sent to representatives for each European Union member state, who will meet on December 12 to vote on the text. Afterwards, the European Commission will be able to adopt the rules.

EU member states include Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.

In September, the Commission said the European government agreed to its proposal to end roaming charges in Europe. This week, the Commission said it will be steadfast to ensure an agreement is reached as soon as possible.

Article Link: European Union Moves Forward With Plans to Eliminate Roaming Charges Next Year
Meanwhile the Trump administration is trying to figure out how to best maximize profits for the telecoms while hurting customers.
 
€0.0085 per MB of data usage" Ahem. Data is measured in GB or parts thereof so that would be €8.50 per 1GB - not bad. Things have improved. Less than six years ago companies were regularly charging "$0.02 per kilobyte" for roaming or for exceeding cap. That, believe it or not, is $20,000- per GB! People were coming home from holidays to enormous bills.

Then it was "reduced" to like $1,500- per GB etc but still quoted in miniscule terms to mislead people. Kid you not.
 
Example: with his EUR70 per month contract, Tim living in Netherlands gets unlimited calls, texts and data for his smartphone. When he travels abroad on holidays, he will have unlimited calls and text. For data, he will get twice the equivalent of EUR70 worth of data at the wholesale roaming data price cap, i.e. 0.85 cent/MB according to the Commission wholesale proposal, meaning more than 16 GB in this case. While roaming, he will get twice the volume he has paid for.

Bad example, here in the Netherlands most of the providers are way less than €70 and none* of the main providers have unlimited internet.
The main ones max out at 12 GB.
There are plenty of people here on a prepaid or simonly plan which are lots, LOTS cheaper.

*There is a lesser known one (few know) called Robin Mobile which does have unlimited data plan but it's not even €50, it's 4G in this package but limited at 25Mbps.
Edit: Even the above provider is not even unlimited, they throttle you after 20GB to 0.4 Mbps
 
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€0.0085 per MB of data usage" Ahem. Data is measured in GB or parts thereof so that would be €8.50 per 1GB - not bad. Things have improved. Less than six years ago companies were regularly charging "$0.02 per kilobyte" for roaming or for exceeding cap. That, believe it or not, is $20,000- per GB! People were coming home from holidays to enormous bills.

Then it was "reduced" to like $1,500- per GB etc but still quoted in miniscule terms to mislead people. Kid you not.

I love the old Version Math call where the customer was quoted something like .002¢ per megabyte and was charged $0.002 per megabyte. The recorded call is a sad reflection of the US's math education.
 
Won't happen. Ever. At best one in 20 people would think this is even a good idea.
For the most part, the EU is in the midst of collapsing. What started out as a good idea with a common currency and common market with free travel and exchange of goods, products and services has turned into an over-regulated nightmare with the EC making up rules and regulations as they go. Brexit was just first step in its collapse. Italeave will be next and the dominoes will all fall.

Nonsense. The EU is great and the way forward. UK just failed to educate its people on all the great things. If you keep bargaining for decades, guess what picture you are creating.

I hope for an independent Scotland!
 
Great news, but still nothing about the fees when you are in your home country and call/text to abroad. Because here in Sweden it is cheaper to, let's say, text to Germany from Poland (or any other EU country) than to text to Germany from Sweden. This is because only roaming is regulated, not the prices to abroad from home.
 
Lol UK. Not for long!

EDIT: In all seriousness - is meddling in private business like this really a good idea?

I know, I know, I am a big, dumb, free market, capitalist American.

Markets are efficient when they have large numbers of buyers and sellers.

Telecoms operators are natural monopolies (or oligopolies) because of the high entry costs involved. They are far from efficient markets. This means that when market failure occurs (for example a disproportionate price like roaming at 1€ per MB) government steps in to regulate.
 
It shouldn't be affected, the roaming offered by Three covers a lot of countries which are not in the EU.

View attachment 676921
Trouble is in my experience three are *&($%^

Maybe ok in bigger towns and cities but in France (Languedoc) it is hopeless and very slow. Better to get a local sim, BTW I am referring here to iPAd, not iPhone.
 
Still don't understand how American carriers do the ass-backwards move of charging for data with unlimited texts, while every other country in the world does practically unlimited data and charges per text. Who's correct?

All countries charge for data. Not sure which country does unlimited data without throttling. I have traveled in Asia and Europe - limited data everywhere.
 
I don't understand the data aspect of it. At https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/roaming-tariffs they say that it's going to be "roam like at home". In this article they calculate contract price, data price and double it. What if I have a really good deal with high data cap and low price? Then it's not "roam like at home"
That sounds correct, at least for national plans.

The example they give is Tom in Finland with the €70 unlimited phone/text/data plan.

When he travels, the equivalent worth of data at the wholesale roaming data price cap (€70/€.0085MB) would 8,235 MB, and he gets double that, so 16,470 MB of data to roam with every month.

Not a horrible deal IMO, but it's not "unlimited data" like at home.

For national packages, the Commission proposes specific solutions to protect consumers from possible domestic price increases:

For pre-paid metered contracts: when you go abroad, you can Roam like at Home up the amount of credit remaining for that month. For data, you can use a volume equivalent to the value of your remaining monthly credit at the wholesale roaming data price cap (currently being debated between the European Parliament and Council).

For the most competitive contracts that offer data at very low domestic prices, below the wholesale cap: when you go abroad you will continue to enjoy your full allowance of calls and texts. For data, you will have twice the volume of data equivalent to the value of your monthly contract in wholesale roaming data price caps.
 
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That sounds correct, at least for national plans.

The example they give is Tom in Finland with the €70 unlimited phone/text/data plan.

When he travels, the value of his €70/month plan (at .€085/MB) is 8235 MB of data, and he gets double that, so 16,470 MB of data to roam with every month.

Not a horrible deal, but it's not "unlimited data" like at home.

NVM
 
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