Travellers using smartphones on holiday will be pleased to hear that the cost of using the web on the devices is to be halved.
Under new plans from Brussels, premium charges for roaming data services will be shelved and new price caps will be rolled out next year for data downloads.
From July 2012, receiving emails or using the web whilst abroad will cost a maximum of 81 pence per megabyte. Come 2014, this will fall to around 40 pence. Currently, the charge sits at around £1.80 per megabyte – a large byte out of a holiday budget.
Last week, an EU directive was rolled out in a bid to lower the cost of making and taking mobile phone calls while in Europe. As a result of the directive, the highest charge will now be capped at 32 pence per minute, excluding VAT.
It will also cost less than 10 pence per minute for calls received while in EU countries. It still costs nothing to receive a text message while in EU countries and a maximum of 10 pence to send one.
