New O2 Business: EU Roam like at Home

Changes from O2 - How does this have an impact on your business?

The new EU rules that come into play for our UK networks in mid-June will not just mean good news! As we are all aware, the new EU regulations called EU Roam like at Home
mean that UK networks have to now incorporate their EU roaming bundles within the normal voice plans. This means there should be no difference to your bill on whether you call your gran from the UK or from around a nice pool in Greece. 

Firstly, the benefits! What does it really mean for calls and texts in Europe?

From 15 June you’ll be able to use your UK allowances when roaming in our Europe Zone. For calling and texting this means you can make calls and send texts back to the UK or within our Europe Zone like you do in the UK,

What’s included at no extra charge:

• Making and receiving calls and sending texts when you’re abroad In our Europe Zone (e.g. a call from France to France)

• Calls and texts to the United Kingdom from any country within our Europe Zone (e.g. a call from France to UK)

• Calls and texts whilst abroad within our Europe Zone to any other country within the Zone (eg - A call from France to Spain

• Calls to your voicemail and receiving voicemails

Countries included within their new plans (Note the countries in BOLD. These are ones outside of EU that they have kindly included);

Austria French Guiana Latvia Reunion Islands Azores Germany Liechtenstein Romania Belgium Gibraltar Lithuania Saint Barthelemy Bulgaria Greece Luxembourg Saint Martin

Canary Islands Guadeloupe Madeira San Marino Croatia Guernsey Malta Slovakia Cyprus Hungary Martinique Slovenia Czech Republic Iceland Monaco Spain Denmark Ireland Netherlands Sweden Estonia Isle of Man Norway Switzerland Finland Italy Poland Vatican City France Jersey Portugal

What’s not included:

• Making calls or sending texts when you are in the United Kingdom to other countries

• Making calls or sending texts to premium rate numbers and other non-geographic numbers (which can vary over time) aren’t included

• Making calls or sending texts from within our Europe Zone to a country outside the Europe Zone

These new EU roaming plans do come at a price though!

The UK networks have started to announce that they will be completely changing their business plans. Already, some have announced changes to other charges, such as calling abroad from the UK. This is not regulated by the new EU rules where networks like O2 are rising in cost from the 8p we have known and loved to rates landing around £1.25p/min!!

The networks have to cover the loss in profit from their once lucrative roaming rates.

This spells bad news for all the business users that do not benefit from using their handsets abroad. Instead, you will be stuck with a rising bill in line rental costs, as well as out of allowance charge rates. This is not just with O2, but with all UK networks. Unfortunately, it does make sense. After all, they are businesses like yourself. If the cost of the material you use to make your product goes up, then so does what you charge. 

The UK networks are making a massive loss in profit from the new EU roaming rules and so has to counter this to ensure they can continue to offer the same service.

Focusing on O2, they have announced that they will also be changing some of their inclusive services such as SMS to the Channel Islands. They have announced that from the 15th June, they will be removing texts to the Channel Islands from inclusive bundles for their business customers.

New Business Tariffs & International Calling Proposition - 15th June

The network has informed us that they do have a silver lining in these changed. Alongside the increase in calls from the UK to abroad, O2 is launching a new portfolio of competitive tariffs which will give Business customers much more choice and flexibility to do business on the go.

These changes will be offering more data choices and more competitive pricing to customers both in the UK and internationally.

The network has given a list of impacts;

• Handset inclusive tariffs
• SIMO
• SIMO data only
• Out of Bundle prices
• New International Calling & Text Bolt-ons
• Sharer tariffs
• Group Shared Data Bolt-ons

What are these changes to the tariffs?

O2 is creating new ways to sell more data through better data options, reduced pricing and bigger data bundles with their handset tariffs. The network will be introducing a 1GB tariff with unlimited minutes, designed for customers that need less data,  but the certainty that minutes & texts will be provided.

What is happening to sharer plans?

Sharer tariffs will be enhanced through a price drop on shared data bolt-ons and the launch of one-month rollover shared data. Out of bundle prices will be aligned against market prices as will premium call prices. Also, a new range of international calling and texting bolt-ons will come into effect from 15th June, providing international calling from as little as 3p per minute. The good news is that this will counter their standard call charge increase.

Why is it good for you?

O2 released the statement "These changes are giving O2 customers the opportunity to have more flexibility with their tariffs, provides additional price point options and gives them the ability to do more with their data".

What do you think? Will these new changes enforced by EU regulations affect you and your business? Now that we have left the EU, do you think these changes should still be made?