Vodafone slashes cost of roaming data

Vodafone will let customers on some monthly plans use their domestic data plan abroad free of charge.

Customers on a tariff costing more than £40 a month will be able to use their own data package without any extra charge in Europe, up to 25MB a day.

Customers on less expensive packages will be able to upgrade for an extra £10 per month, giving them a data package to use at home and in Europe, or pay a flat fee of £2 a day for 50MB of roaming data.

“This is the year of the smartphone and we want our 35 million European data users to feel free to use their devices in Europe in the same way as they do at home,” said Vodafone chief executive Vittorio Colao.

The plans will be rolled out over the next couple of months, and the offers are open to business customers and consumers.

The new data prices are a big change from Vodafone’s tone on roaming charges this summer. A tariff announced in May would see UK consumers charged £1 for the first 5MB of roaming data each day, and £5 for each following 5MB.

Those tariffs will still apply to any customers on contract less than £40 a month, who don’t choose to pay the extra £2 a day for the roaming package.

In 2009, Vodafone dropped roaming charges for the summer, drawing the ire of the Advertising Standards Authority for claiming to have “abolished” roaming tariffs.