Alex Kinch

Looking forward to the next round of EU roaming caps from July 1st? If you’re a T-Mobile customer prepare to be disappointed – the operator is putting prices up from June 28th.

The current cost for making a call whilst roaming – 38p – will increase to 44p from the end of June. Receiving calls and receiving texts remains static (19p per minute and free of charge, respectively). Sending a text drops from 25p to 11p.

So how does this work with the EU roaming caps? Let’s recap (no pun intended) the announcement from April 22nd:

In a 646 for and 22 against vote, sending a text whilst roaming in Europe will now fall to a maximum of 11 euro cents (10p), data charges will be capped at 1 euro per megabyte, and voice charges will fall again – from an already capped maximum of 46 euro cents per minute to 43 euro cents.

Those cap figures are excluding VAT by the way. So let’s do some maths, with a little help from XE.com’s currency conversion calculator. The figures below are based on the rate at time of writing this article.

Sending a text:

EU cap (ex VAT): 11 eurocents / 9.53 pence
EU cap (inc 15% UK VAT): 12.65 eurocents / 10.96 pence
T-Mobile new rate: 11p

Result: FAIL

Making a call:

EU cap (ex VAT): 43 eurocents / 37.26 pence
EU cap (inc 15% UK VAT): 49.45 eurocents / 42.849 pence
T-Mobile new rate: 44p

Result: FAIL

Data charges:

EU cap (ex VAT): 1 euro / £0.8661
EU cap (inc 15% UK VAT): 1.15 euro / £0.996
T-Mobile new rate: £1.50

Result: MASSIVE FAIL

T-Mobile claim on their website: ‘The yearly price cap set by the EU Commission is set in euros. Due to the current economic climate and the relative weakness of the pound (GBP) against the euro (EUR), the cost of supporting using your phone abroad has increased. We’ve changed the rate to reflect the increased costs we’ve faced over the past year and continue to face now. But we’re still complying with EU regulations.’

Are you? Really? Or is there a little loophole somewhere or other T-Mobile are taking advantage of? I’ve asked their press team for a comment – will update this article when I hear back.

(Thanks to @patphelan for the tip-off).

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Tagged as roaming charges, T-Mobile + Categorized as Mobile News