Don’t get stung by roaming charges this summer

Blog

We’re sure you’ve heard about the changes to roaming charges for many UK customers.

We’ve put together a handy checklist of where and when Brits are and aren’t covered to make sure all of our customers, whether they are travelling for business or pleasure, avoid any nasty surprises on their return ✅

Three

  • Pay monthly or SIM-only users who joined or renewed on or after 1 October 2021 will be charged £2 a day to use their standard allowances while travelling in the Europe to Go Roam destinations.
  • For non-European destinations this will be £5 a day. A full list of Go Roam is available here.

EE

  • At EE, those that took out a new monthly handset or SIM plan on or after 7 July 2021 face a £2 a day roaming fee in the European roaming zone.
  • To avoid the daily charge, customers can opt for the Roam Abroad add-on, which allows customers to use their standard minutes, texts and data allowances in 47 European destinations as well as the US, Canada, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand for £10 a month.
  • You can check exactly what’s available for your destination here.

Vodafone

  • For Vodafone customers that took out a new or renewed their contracted on or after 11 August 2021, there’s now a daily charge, depending on where you’re travelling to. If it’s one of 49 European destinations, it will be £2 a day, but for worldwide destinations, it could be up to £6 a day.
  • However, it’s possible to avoid these charges by signing up for a Vodafone Xtra plan, which allows customers to use their UK allowance of data, minutes and texts at no extra costs at 83 global destinations.

Is there an alternative to paying to travel?

  • It’s important to note that these changes only apply if you took out or renewed a contract on or after any of the above stated days. If you haven’t done this before the set dates you won’t have to pay the roaming charges until your current contract has expired, and you can still roam in the EU for free.
  • If you did take out a new contract after these deadlines, you could consider switching to a network that still offers free EU roaming such as Virgin Media O2 or other smaller providers. However, it’s important to note that there’s no guarantee that these other networks won’t implement the same charges in the future.