Mobile roaming charges to end within two years, says European Parliament

The parliament’s industry committee has approved a deal to end roaming charges. The deal had previously been agreed with EU governments and the European Commission, the parliament said.

The EU has been reducing roaming charges since 2007 and the parliament has “repeatedly asked for them to be scrapped altogether”, it said.

Roaming charges will be abolished from 15 June 2017, except where consumers exceed a “fair use” cap on the use of mobile data services abroad. This will follow a transitional period from 16 April 2016 until 14 June 2017 when operators will be able to charge a “small additional amount” on top of domestic prices.

For example, if you pay eight euro cents per minute for an outgoing call at home, making the call from another EU country should not cost more than 13 euro cents, the parliament said.

The committee published a table setting out the maximum regulated roaming charges, as agreed by the Commission and member states.