Nearly 17 percent of the Brits (1 in 6 holidaymakers) have suffered from “bill shock,” after using their mobile phones on holiday overseas last year, claims a new report.
New research report published by consumer champion Which? revealed that the mobile networks have charged 1 in 4 Brits (25 percent) with more than £40 above their usual monthly usage.
In the survey of 2114 UK adults in June 2014, around 39 percent or 4 in 10 Brits said that they didn’t know about their legal right to challenge their provider over an excessive bill. Almost 48 percent of the people surveyed were not aware that they can refuse to pay for their phone usage above the cap level, when they have capped their mobile phone usage with the provider.
The report comes in time with the new EU roaming charge cap introduced today, that will lower costs for people travelling within the EU.
With the new rules, the maximum charge will be 19¢ per minute or a total of 18.24p for outgoing calls, 6¢ per minute or 5.76p for outgoing text messages, 5¢ instead of 7¢ per minute for incoming voice calls, and 20¢ or a total of 19.2p per minute for a MB download of data, excluding VAT.
The Which? research also noted that nearly half of the Brits surveyed thought the price caps introduced, applies to all countries within Europe and not just the EU.
