Giffgaff said that from 26th July, giffgaff members will be able to use up to 5GB of their goodybag allowance in the EU and selected destinations at no extra cost. Beyond this, there’ll be a charge of 10p/mb while roaming. giffgaff eu roaming data

The operator indicated that this change reflected the fact that they incur interconnect costs when customers roam in the EU and all UK mobile networks have had to absorb this cost (we suspect that’s much harder for budget providers). On the upside, giffgaff are at least still leaving customers with some degree of inclusive EU roaming, even if you’ll now need to pay much closer attention to their data usage.

Complete giffgaff announcement is below:

“Hi everyone,

We wanted to give you all an important update on some changes that’ll be going live in the next month and let you know all the details.

We will be making some changes to our EU roaming allowance to ensure we can continue to offer great value at home and still provide you with data while you’re abroad. From 26th July, giffgaff members will be able to use up to 5GB of their goodybag allowance in the EU and selected destinations at no extra cost. Beyond this, there’ll be a charge of 10p/mb while roaming.

We know that having data while in the EU is important to you all, however, as some of you might know, we incur interconnect costs when people roam in the EU. Under the EU legislation, all UK mobile networks had to absorb this cost. Considering the difficulties that arise from the cost of living crisis, we wanted to do as much as we can to help so we have taken the decision to mitigate some of that cost, so that we can at least give our members up to 5GB to roam in the EU, at no extra cost.

Providing 5GB of data while you’re abroad enables the vast majority of our members to still roam in the EU within their current goodybag allowance and if they happen to need more the price per MB would be exactly the same as they would be charged if they were in UK.
Making this change has enabled us to put in place our Fixed UK Prices, we believe that prioritising freezing UK tariffs and giving you peace of mind for your bills at home is the right thing for us to do.

If you’re heading to the EU soon, we hope that 5GB, plus unlimited calls and texts will still allow you to enjoy your trip abroad. Back in 2019, over 90% of our members used less than 5GB when roaming in the EU each month. If you’re worried you could go over 5GB, here’s some information to give a sense of how much data is used when online:

• Browsing the internet – 140MB for 60 webpages (5GB = 2,143 webpages)
• Listening to music – 80MB per hour (5GB = 62.5 hours)
• Browsing social media (average of Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram) – 2.13MB per minute (5GB = 39 hours)
• WhatsApp messaging – 0.0007 per message (5GB = 7.14 million messages)
• Using Maps – 5MB per hour (5GB = 1,000 hours)

Your giffgaff app and our website is free to use, so you can keep an eye on how much data you’re using while away without eating into your data. We’ll also let you know when you’re nearing the 5GB limit, both at 80% and again at 100%.”

Much like Tesco, giffgaff are also an O2 (VMO2) based Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO). As most people may recall, O2 are currently the only primary operator to buck the trend and make a solid commitment to retain free EU roaming. Sky Mobile, which is another O2 based MVNO provider, also started charging for EU roaming at the start of May. giffgaff eu roaming data

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