3 asks for lower data roaming charges
3 UK has launched a campaign to combat the ‘rip-off’ data roaming charges in Europe with an open letter addressed to the government minister in charge of telecoms regulation:
Three’s customers make the most of their smartphones, but data roaming charges force them to limit their internet use the moment they leave the UK. High wholesale data charges should be capped at €30 per GB or less to make mobile internet accessible wherever consumers want to use it. With average data use for our smartphone customers approaching 1GB a month this is a real consumer issue
By 2014 a customer using 1GB of data abroad could still be charged around £400 if a European plan to standardize the charges customers pay for using mobile data outside the UK goes through.
It is understandable why Three may want to act upon this when inside the UK it only costs around £10 or less for 1GB of data for a month. You can even get unlimited data for cheap. The network’s campaign has received some support from various trade companies and many more businesses will be likely to support 3’s campaign. This is especially so as data roaming prices are very limiting while companies and customers alike are becoming more dependent on smartphone access throughout the day.
