I’ve always been sent a text when I connect to the network of a different country. It happened immediately when I crossed over from France to Monaco, for example.
This time last year I stayed on Bardsey Island, off the Welsh Coast. There’s hardly any phone signal on the island, but they warned everyone to turn off roaming on their phones anyway. It turns out that because of the mountain on the island blocking the signal from the UK, lots of phones automatically connect to Irish providers, and cost more than people expect
The island is tiny, and only has about half a dozen houses on it. The visitors are there because it’s a nature reserve, so generally don’t want to be on their phones anyway. It’s not worth setting up a relay station over just telling everyone before they get there.
I’m always cautious about comparing the US to the EU too closely, but in this case it fits, as both are continent-wide common markets. If you “live and travel within the EU,” it barely counts as international travel for economic concerns.
AFAIK, most of the pan-European plans cover the whole Schengen Area (including Switzerland), and the most of the former USSR boarders aren’t all that porous, unlike the NAFTA boarders.
Unless you live and travel within the EU. Then you can use your phone as much as you want and know that you won’t get a higher bill than usual.
Unless you are dangerously close to a non-EU country and can’t reliably prevent your phone from connecting to its networks
shakes fist at Andorra
Never thought of that. Scary though.
I’ve always been sent a text when I connect to the network of a different country. It happened immediately when I crossed over from France to Monaco, for example.
This time last year I stayed on Bardsey Island, off the Welsh Coast. There’s hardly any phone signal on the island, but they warned everyone to turn off roaming on their phones anyway. It turns out that because of the mountain on the island blocking the signal from the UK, lots of phones automatically connect to Irish providers, and cost more than people expect
It’s weird they wouldn’t work with a UK based telco to set up a relay station explicitly to prevent this.
Why prevent it, when you can just shrug your shoulders and rake in the money?
The island is tiny, and only has about half a dozen houses on it. The visitors are there because it’s a nature reserve, so generally don’t want to be on their phones anyway. It’s not worth setting up a relay station over just telling everyone before they get there.
I’m always cautious about comparing the US to the EU too closely, but in this case it fits, as both are continent-wide common markets. If you “live and travel within the EU,” it barely counts as international travel for economic concerns.
The rest of North America would like a word with you…
No more so than Switzerland and the former USSR west of the Urals, I suppose.
AFAIK, most of the pan-European plans cover the whole Schengen Area (including Switzerland), and the most of the former USSR boarders aren’t all that porous, unlike the NAFTA boarders.
Beware of Swizerland