Cellphone Roaming Charges End in Europe. Many Respond With a Yawn.<br />But the experience of Ms. Krastanova, and many others like her, has many wondering why the region’s policy makers took 10 years —<br />and invested significant political capital — to end roaming charges when it is not a daily concern for many of Europe’s 500 million citizens.<br />By MARK SCOTTJUNE 14, 2017<br />After a decade of debate, Europe will finally abolish cellphone roaming charges this week, allowing people from Britain to Bulgaria to call, send text messages<br />and surf the web without incurring eye-watering charges when traveling across the 28-nation bloc.<br />"It’s for the few, not the many." Defenders of Europe’s digital policies reject such criticism, saying<br />that removing cellphone roaming charges took time because it represented the bedrock for the rest of the region’s digital plans.<br />While there will be strict caps on how much telecom operators can charge when individuals are outside their home countries, cellphone carriers can increase other fees, including phone calls<br />and text messages to other European countries when people are not traveling, to recoup potential lost income.<br />Roberto Viola said that We’re trying to create a Europe without digital borders,<br />And while the roaming rules took longer than many had first expected, Europe’s other digital proposals, she said, were still on track.
