Vodafone raises prices as EU roaming fees disappear

Roaming ends and Vodafone raises its prices

On the eve of the abolition of EU roaming, Vodafone has taken the opportunity to review its tariffs upwards. The official excuse: to make up for the loss of the roaming surcharge. The practical result: customers who don't negotiate will pay more for the same. The debate is not new, but the timing turns it into a test of trust in the regulator.

Part of the analysis holds that the big carriers are no longer an option without an integrated bundle, designed to get customers to upgrade beyond what they signed up for. For everything else, there are the low-cost carriers. The opposing camp, backed by experience, argues the opposite: Vodafone is by far the cheapest, provided you repeat the retention negotiation every year. The ritual takes half an hour a year and cuts 50% off the official price. Some have been doing it for more than a decade.

The practical case: 50 Mbps fibre, 6 GB and 200 mobile minutes come to €26.50 a month with the discount. Some people pay €40 for fibre, landline, mobile, TV and football, though that price is rarely the official one. There is also the customer who spends nearly €70 on fibre and two lines but won't switch because the service works "like clockwork".

The underlying problem? The end of roaming doesn't make the bill cheaper: it shifts the cost from one item to another. Meanwhile, the consumer's only defence is to go through the counter-offer ritual or flee to the world of callback operators and low-cost carriers. The regulator smiles for the photo; the user pays for the fine print.