Use your UK bundles in Europe!

[Martin-O2]

Hi everyone, 

We have some great news regarding roaming in Europe.

from 15 June customers on O2’s Pay Monthly, Pay As You Go and Business tariffs will be able to use their inclusive allowances while travelling in Europe. So while the weather will hopefully be different to the UK, using their phone won’t be. And to celebrate, three lucky people will have the chance to win a weekend break to a European destination.

O2 customers don’t need to do anything to take advantage of the changes. Instead, from Thursday 15 June they’ll simply be able to make and receive calls and texts to anyone in O2’s Europe Zone and use their data allowance too. If they need extra data while they’re abroad, O2 customers will be able to add a Bolt On just like they can at home – they’ll be able to use any leftover data when they return too.

To help get people in to the holiday spirit, O2 is giving away three weekend breaks to a European destination and full details will be announced through its social media channels later today. Each break is for two people and includes flights, accommodation and £500 spending money. For more info on this giveaway check out the terms and conditions here 

O2’s Europe Zone covers 47 countries for Pay Monthly and Business customers. These are: Austria, Azores, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canary Islands, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, French Guiana, Germany, Gibraltar (UK), Greece, Guadeloupe, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Madeira, Malta, Martinique, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Reunion Islands, Romania, Saint Barthelemy, Saint Martin (French), San Marino, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, The Netherlands and Vatican City. Destinations outside the EU/EEA are also included – Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Monaco and Switzerland.

For Pay As You Go customers Guernsey, Isle of Man, Jersey, Monaco and Switzerland aren’t included in O2’s Europe Zone. Customers can still access these destinations at O2’s standard European rates or via the O2 Travel Bolt On. Pay As You Go £30 Big Bundle customers can use up to 10GB of their 20GB data allowance.

• From 15 June, O2 customers can use their inclusive calls, texts and data bundles when travelling to Europe at no extra cost.

• O2’s Europe Zone for Pay Monthly and Business customers covers 47 countries including Jersey, Guernsey and Switzerland.

• A chance to win one of three European weekend trips for two people in June, July and August including flights, accommodation and £500 spending money

O2 will be texting its customers about the changes from 15 May. For more information, including all the applicable terms and conditions see below.

Pay Monthly terms and conditions

Pay As You Go terms and conditions

If you have any questions about the roaming changes please ask 

[NFH]

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@darrengf wrote:

as far as I'm aware. It's always been like this and I'm sure by now some where some one would have said something or ofcom would have noticed.

im not saying it's right or wrong, but consumers ask a lot if certain places are covered because it just says Spain and not Canary Islands.  All this does is make it clearer.

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The issue here is not listing regions or islands for clarification purposes, but misleadingly counting them as separate countries in the total of "47 countries", which consumers will inevitably compare to Three's "42 destinations". It's fine to show that the Canary Islands, for example, are included, but not to state "47 countries", which is blatant lying. Instead it should say "32 countries and 4 territories" or "36 destinations".

[Anonymous]

Well Martin, I have very BAD news for you about roaming in the Canary Islands:

I used to be able to connect to a roaming network immediately my phone was turned on over there - and reconnect to O2 when back in the UK automatically.

O2 seem to have crippled Auto selection for everyone now, surprising as Telefonica in Spain own O2 - I can't even connect automatically on my stone-age PAYG O2 phone from 2017 and on my monthly tariff smartphone it's been like that for some time.  I put the latter down to the fact that it was an unlocked smartphone, but since my simple PAYG stopped connecting this year I've started to doubt this theory.

O2 Customer Services have been absolutely no help whatsoever - ring them - select option - listen to ten minutes of music-on-hold - explain problem to someone with a foreign accent - ask to speak to someone technical - more music on hold - explain again - technical person drops your call.  

Above loop repeats - give up.

[Anonymous]

Actually being able to connect to a EU network telephone provider with a simple phone handset automatically would be nice - and then connect back to O2 in the UK upon one's return.  Like we used to be able to do, Martin.

[NFH]

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@darrengf wrote:

Vodafone lists the countries differently. They list the main county and including country (Not listed separately)

http://www.vodafone.co.uk/cs/groups/public/documents/webcontent/vfcon079682.pdf

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Vodafone advertises that 40 destinations are covered. Vodafone is mostly accurate with limited exceptions. It counts the French West Indies (but no other départements of France) as a separate destination, despite them being part of France (not an overseas territory), and it counts San Marino as separate destination despite it being for mobile telephony purposes part of Italy. At the same time, Vodafone incorrectly includes the Faroe Islands as part of Denmark, despite them being outside the EEA and a separate jurisdiction for mobile telephony purposes, and it groups Jersey and Guernsey together as the Channel Islands, despite them being separate jurisdictions. Therefore Vodafone's total of 40 destinations is correct but only by accident.

[NFH]

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@darrengf wrote:

EE list it similar to o2

http://shop.ee.co.uk/international/travelling-abroad#destinations

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Indeed. EE advertises "48 destinations", specifically "Austria, Azores, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Canary Islands, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, French Guyana, Germany, Gibraltar, Greece, Guadeloupe, Guernsey, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Isle of Man, Italy, Jersey, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Madeira, Malta, Martinique, Mayotte, Monaco, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Republic of Cyprus (not including Northern Cyprus), Reunion Islands, Romania, Saint Martin, Saint Barthelemy, San Marino, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Vatican City (Italy)". Of the "48 destinations", 10 are regions or islands of EU countries already listed and therefore should not be counted in the total - "Azores, Canary Islands, French Guyana, Guadeloupe, Madeira, Martinique, Mayotte, Reunion Islands [sic], Saint Barthelemy, Saint Martin". San Marino and Vatican City should not be counted because for mobile telephony purposes they are part of Italy. The truth is that EE applies domestic prices to only 36 countries and territories. Furthermore, EE misleadingly states that roaming will be "free" in these destinations, which Schedule 1 Paragraph 20 of the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 describes as an unfair commercial practice. Roaming is not free, but charged at domestic prices; a payment is required.

[darrengf]

But if no one reports it to ASA then nothing will be done.

Three is accurate as it says the county then including.

so the 2 networks which are correct are Vodafone and Three.

but I'm sure o2 and EE would have checked first before putting it up there on web?

[NFH]

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@darrengf wrote:

but I'm sure o2 and EE would have checked first before putting it up there on web?

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It seems they didn't. It's also very suspicious that both O2 and EE make the same mistake where they refer to Réunion (a département of France) as "Reunion Islands". I've been there and there's definitely only one island. This error suggests that one copied most of the list from the other.

[Marjo]

Hey guys, thanks so much for continuing to post your feedback.

Your comments have been fed back to the appropriate teams within O2.

[Curr946]

Awesome 😁

[NFH]

It seems that all the networks are increasing their number of non-EEA destinations for roaming at domestic rates. Three has announced that, by adding Brazil and Singapore, it is increasing the number of destinations from 42 to 60. I don't see how 42 + 2 = 60. Three also announced that the number of non-European destinations will be increasing from 8 to 12, which means that 14 of the new destinations will be in Europe. I hope that Three will not be joining O2 and EE in misleadingly counting regions and islands as countries or destinations.