International calls - Eyewatering £1.50 per minute to Europe??? ... and only 4.6p when in Europe?

[Aleksandras]

I can not get my head around the cost of International calls on Vodafone - £1.50 per minute to Europe??? and only 4.6p when in Europe. So being in UK and calling Europe costs 32 times more than being across the Channel.

Also it will cost you 55p to call in UK if you are out of your inclusive minutes and the same 4.6p if you are in Europe. I think it is outragous abuse from Vodafone towards their customers. How a single Vodafone customer can be happy if they (unaware of the cost) phoned to Europe or used minutes outside their allowance...

Plan switching charge £20? Really?

Vodafone? Any reasonable explanation on this?

[AnnS]

Hi @Aleksandras

Couldn't agree more, it's about time the Regulator, Ofcom, did something about the charges for calling Internationally from the UK. However, Vodafone are not the only guilty party, all UK networks charge the same.

The only thing you can do on Vodafone is to add Vodafone International for an extra charge of £5.00 per month.  Although a chargeable service, it will make it cheaper to call abroad from the UK.

Further info for you below.

Calling and Texting Abroad from the UK

[donnyguy]

Vodafone won't exaplain this Aleksandras.

Basically the cost of using your phone abroad in the European Union is regulated meaning they (all companies actually - not just Vodafone) have been forced to lower prices year on year. 

However calls from the UK are not regulated meaning they can (and do) charge the earth for calling abroad.

So if I want to call Greece from the UK, I pay £1.50 per minute to both landlines and mobiles and 35p per text. This is because it's not regulated.

If i go abroad and want to make the same call, it'll come out my allowance (so I roamed in Portugal, called a Greek number and it was inclusive). Sending a text will cost 1.8p per text.

So first scenario (in the UK), Vodafone have a free hand to charge what they like. Second scenario (EU roaming), they don't.

Also it's worth adding, as AnnS mentioned, there are options to make your calls cheaper. You can pay £5 and get Vodafone International which allows calls to European mobiles for 15p. I personally upgraded to the option where you paid an amount and got an allowance. But be warned, the eye watering £1.50 charge kicks in the second your allowance is up. That left me with a painful bill.

It's worth checking out the rivals, I now call Greece for 5p per minute (landline and mobile numbers) from my work mobile which belongs to another network. I now only make international calls from my Vodafone line when I'm overseas - it's the only time I can afford to use it!!

[Annie_N]

The strangest part of this is that on Vodafone's PAYG tariff, calling Greece would only be £1 per minute.

Into the bargain, opting in to Vodafone International is entirely free on PAYG, and calls to landlines then go down to 5p per minute.

Or, for the USA, using Vodafone International, it's a mere 1.5p per minute (also mobiles, because of the strange US pricing structure). So I can chat to friends in the USA for 1.5p per minute until my balance runs out. At 90p per hour, that would take some time.

[Getafix]

Since May, All Tariffs have gone up. So we do pay for the Euro Roaming.