Vodafone will reintroduce roaming charges for UK customers who travel in mainland Europe from next year. New and upgrading customers will have to pay up to £2 a day to use their monthly allowance of data, calls and text messages.
Travellers from the UK had been able to escape roaming charges thanks to a ban on the fees throughout the European Union since 2017. But the trade deal brokered between the bloc and the UK did not allow for Britons to keep this advantage. Despite this, the four main networks - EE, O2, Three, and Vodafone - had said there were no plans to reintroduce roaming fees.
But EE, which is owned by BT, became the first to change its mind in June. Vodafone said that customers travelling to the Republic of Ireland will be exempt from the charges. Also, existing customers will not be affected while they remain on their current phone plan and, while terms and conditions for new and upgrading customers will change from 11 August, the roaming charges will apply from 6 January next year.
Ahmed Essam, Vodafone's chief executive in the UK, said: "The majority of our customers are not regular roamers. "Indeed, fewer than half our customers roamed beyond the Republic of Ireland in 2019.
