EU Roaming Charges Will End By June 2017

The European Union has been talking about abolishing mobile roaming charges between the member states for a long time now and it’s likely to go ahead with the move by mid-June. The European Comission, parliament, and representatives of the 28 member states have come to an agreement on wholesale roaming charges that will make life easier for mobile users moving freely across Europe.

“This was the last piece of the puzzle. As of 15 June, Europeans will be able to travel in the EU without roaming charges,” said Andrus Ansip, the European Commission’s VP for the Digital Single Market.

Just one formality remains now which involves the European Parliament and Council to vote on the agreement. Given that an agreement has been reached, there won’t be any surprises during the vote. The European Commission is calling this move “roam-like-at-home” and has set June 15th as the date it goes into service.

A fact sheet has been released today which details the fair use policy as well as wholesale roaming caps on voice calls, text messages, and mobile data. It does mention that those who exceed their contract limits while roaming will not have to pay additional charges higher than the wholesale caps.

The European Commission is going to review the situation by the end of 2019 to ascertain whether this move has achieved the desired results or if some changes have to be made in order to achieve the intended result.

Adnan Farooqui
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: europe, roaming