Loading ...Since the 1st of July there have been a number of changes in the maximum rates that mobile service providers can charge within the EU:
- The maximum roaming call rate has been cut to £0.34/minute (10% reduction)
- The maximum roaming rate (receiving calls) has been cut to £0.13/minute (20% reduction)
- Data roaming charges have been capped at about £42 a month (unless a higher limit has been previously agreed)
However it is not all good news; some non-EU rates have increased, For example T-Mobile has increased its call rates from some popular holiday locations from £1.50 to £2.50/minute!
Horror stories abound of data roaming charges when travelling outside of the EU as many people just don’t realise that this is chargeable and very expensive. For example, posting ten 1MB photos onto Facebook from the World Cup in South Africa could cost in excess of £80.
The safe option is to turn off data roaming and instead connect to a local WiFi network which is free in a lot of hotels and cafes. Instead of calling, send texts; even outside of the EU these rarely cost more than £0.25 to send and are always free to receive.
With organisations having made significant cost cuts recently, Andrew Brackenbury, Cost, Purchase & Supplier Management consultant gave his views
A client in Surrey asked us to review annual banking charges of £103k that included cash processing costs of