For Europeans, going on vacation with a smartphone can be an expensive time. Currently, networks are allowed to charge what they like for calls, texts and data when roaming in another country. Packages are available, but often these are as almost as expensive as paying by the MB. An example -- my trip to BlackBerry Devcon Europe in February cost me £20 for just 20MB of data. Times are to begin to change though, as an EU Parliament vote has passed that is designed to reduce the cost of using your phone abroad.
Effective from July, the new rates see caps imposed in EU countries of 24p a minute for calls, and 58p per MB of data. It could still be an expensive trip, but the fact is still that it's a step in the right direction. In addition, from 2014, mobile users will be able to choose which networks they roam on. The overall strategy is to introduce some parity between domestic and international mobile charges across the EU by 2015.
via Coolsmartphone
