Roaming Charges to End in the EU by June 2017

Photo source: europarl.europa.eu – © AP/European Union/EP

A complete ban on roaming charges for using mobile phones abroad in the European Union will take effect in June 2017 and clear rules on the right to Internet access will become law following Parliament’s final approval of the new telecoms package recently.

“This abolition of roaming surcharges has been long awaited by everybody: ordinary people, start-ups, SMEs and all kinds of organisations”, said the rapporteur, Pilar del Castillo (EPP, ES), in the debate before the vote. “Thanks to this agreement, Europe will also become the only region in world which legally guarantees open Internet and net neutrality. The principle of net neutrality will be applied directly in the 28 member states. It also ensures that we will not have a two-speed internet.”

Roaming fees for calling, sending text messages and using the mobile Internet abroad in the EU (and in EEA countries) will be banned from June 15, 2017.

From April 30, 2016, roaming surcharges (added to the price paid at home) must not exceed:

• €0.05 per minute for outgoing voice calls
• €0.02 for text messages (SMS), or
• €0.05 per megabyte of mobile internet use.

The cap on charges for incoming voice calls will be determined later this year and is expected to be considerably lower than for outgoing calls.

Recovering costs and preventing abuse

If operators can prove that they cannot recover their costs and that this affects domestic prices, national regulatory authorities may authorize them to impose minimal surcharges in exceptional circumstances to recover these costs. MEPs won guarantees that national regulatory authorities will have the means to amend or reject the surcharges.

Open access to Internet

The new law will also oblige firms offering Internet access to treat all traffic equally, i.e. not to block or slow delivery of content, applications or services from selected senders or to selected receivers, unless this is necessary to obey court orders, comply with laws, prevent network congestion or combat cyber-attacks. If such traffic management measures are needed, they will have to be “transparent, non-discriminatory and proportionate” and may not last for longer than necessary.