EE, Vodafone and Sky bring back controversial fee – Three Mobile customers are next

If you’ve booked your summer holiday and heading are away to places such as Spain, Italy or France you might want to check your smartphone contract. Some EE and Vodafone users – who have recently joined these networks or updated their current plans – are already facing a £2 per day fee for using their smartphones in the EU. Vodafone updated its terms back in January with EE following in March.

Next up it was the turn of Sky Mobile with this firm changing its rules last week. Users will now also be hit by a similar £2 charge when wanting to check their emails, send a text or post a picture from the beach on social media.

These new EU fees mean a family of four will face a bill of over £100 when returning from a two-week break…ouch!

If you use Three Mobile you might be feeling pretty smug as, right now, the network isn’t charging anything extra for data roaming. However, that’s all about to change later this month.

Three confirmed last year that it was joining EE, Sky and Vodafone by bringing back the dreaded fee.

READ MORE: Millions of Sky customers face shock new fee TODAY as new rule comes into force

Right now, Three customers can use their devices for free in over 71 destinations, including the US and Australia, but users affected by the changes will see a £2 per day fee added when in the EU and a £5 charge when heading further afield.

The update will come into force from May 23 and will affect anyone who took out a new contract or upgraded their existing deal after 1 October last year.

Explaining more about the update, a Three spokesperson said: “Any customers who take out a new contract or upgrade with Three from 1 October 2021 will pay a charge of £2 per day when roaming within the EU applicable from May 23, 2022. PAYG customers and customers who have taken out a contract before 1 October 2021 are unaffected by these changes.

“The new charge ensures that customers are clear on what they will pay when using their phone in another country and only those who roam will pay for the service. It will also ensure that we can continue investing in our UK network.”

So that’s the news of EE, Vodafone, Sky Mobile and Three but what about O2?

This firm is doing things slightly differently with its customers now restricted by a fair usage policy which means that they must not exceed 25GB of data whilst out of the UK.

Once that allowance is used up a charge of £3.50 per extra 1GB will then be added to bills – as an example of how much this could cost, a full HD movie is around 4GB in size so one night in front of a movie will cost £14.