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Orange announces daily data roaming bundle for Europe

by Hugo Jobling on 18 July 2011, 11:45

Tags: Orange (NYSE:FTE)

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Holiday package

Orange has introduced a new roaming option for customers travelling in Europe, called the EU Daily Mobile Internet Browsing Bundle, which offers 30MB of data at a cost of £3. The launch falls in line with the coming into force of European Commission legislation designed to limit the excessive cost of roaming charges, and is likely to be welcomed by those previously paying many times this rate for similar amounts of data while abroad.

As the name suggests, this allowance is only extended for a day - or more specifically 24 hours from the previous midnight to the next. If the 30MB bundle is used up, data is charged at £3.07 per megabyte - a steep increase. However, Orange says that 99.5 per cent of its customers' needs will be served by the provision of 30MB of data - it may not be enough to stream YouTube videos, but for sending emails and checking Facebook a few times it should be sufficient.

The cost is high compared to data use in the UK, but not too disparate from other networks. T-Mobile, for instance, charges £1 for 3MB to use in a day, £5 for 20MB to use over a week, or £10 for 50MB to use over a month, so the relative value will be determined by customer data use, not outright comparison. Vodafone offers 25MB of daily roaming data for £2 but more interestingly includes that allowance in tariffs of £40 or greater, and will bolt it on to a cheaper one for £10 a month.

Regardless of the gradual introduction of cheaper, more generous roaming data plans, mobile internet use while abroad remains an expensive option. While the EC is looking to impose more limits, for now it looks like these bundles are the best we're going to see.

 



HEXUS Forums :: 7 Comments

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This is good news, £3 for 30MB is much better that the £3 a MB they charged me while I was away.
This will come in handy.
Its a great deal compared to previous offerings and prices, but still £3 per mb if you go over this 30mb is day light robbery. Clearly they should allow you just to pay another lump sum for another lump sum of data. Orange clearly intending to cash in on people going over 30mb in 24 hours. People will turn on data roaming on a modern smart phone and see a percentage of this allowance disappear on updates and auto syncing.

Safer just not to use data roaming.
Vodafone have had this for ages: they charge £2 for the first 25mb, £1 / MB for the next 5, then £5 / 5MB block thereafter. 25MB is plenty for the vast majority of smartphone usage per day (I rarely go over ~ 20MB/day in the uk, so if you know it's costing you more overseas then you should be able to manage your data usage). The only problem comes if you tether your laptop then Steam / Windows decides to download updates :rolleyes:

That was a very expensive mistake :(
I wonder, do I have to set this up before I leave? Or as I get there…