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My Norwegian cellular provider has given me a two month deal where I can use 50 GB of cellular data per month. After this 50 GB limit, I have unlimited data, but at very low speeds.

I traveled to Sweden with this plan, and received the following term in an SMS:

I EU/EØS bruker du av min/SMS/MMS som er inkludert i abonnementet ditt, samt inntil 10GB av datamengden.

My translation:

Within the EU/EEC you use the SMS/MMS that is included in your subscription as well as 10 GB of the data.

Customer care have informed me that for EU roaming data usage, the speed will be limited after 10 GB, as opposed to 50 GB for usage in Norway.

The official EU website says:

You pay exactly the same price for using these services when travelling in the EU as you would if you were at home. In practice, your operator simply charges or takes your roaming consumption from the volumes in your domestic mobile tariff plan / bundle.

Is my carrier allowed to give me a separate bundle for EU usage? The EU quote makes it appear that the same bundle should apply to both.

My carrier's customer care department argues that this two month period is a "test period" and that during this "test period" they're allowed to discriminate between domestic usage and EU usage.

Are they correct? Is this allowed?

Edit: It might not matter to the answer, but it turns out that the customer care misinformed me, and that they actually do not limit the speed in the EU, instead they charge (80 NOK per GB) for EU use after the cap.

Fiksdal
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1 Answers1

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Yes, this seems allowed. The frequently asked questions regarding "Roam like at home" listed on the EU site, include the following answer:

If at home you have unlimited mobile data or very cheap mobile data, your operator may apply a safeguard (fair use) limit on data use while roaming. If this is the case, the operator will have to inform you in advance about such a limit and have to alert you in case you reach it. That safeguard limit will be high enough to cover most, if not all, of your roaming needs. Beyond this threshold, you can continue data roaming, subject to a small charge (maximum €7.70/GB + VAT; this will decline gradually to reach €2.50/GB as of 2022).

Formally, if you have a so-called "open data bundle", then the maximum amount of data you can use while abroad is regulated by clause 2 of article 4 of the regulation (EU) 2016/2286:

Without prejudice to any applicable domestic volume limit, in the case of an open data bundle, the roaming customer shall be able to consume when periodically travelling in the Union a volume of data roaming retail services at the domestic retail price equivalent to at least twice the volume obtained by dividing the overall domestic retail price of that open data bundle, excluding VAT, corresponding to the entire billing period by the regulated maximum wholesale roaming charge referred to in Article 12 of Regulation (EU) No 531/2012.

"Open data bundle" refers to a plan in which data is either unlimited or offered at a very low price. This is likely the case for your 50GB plan.

The current maximum wholesale roaming charge is €7,70 per gigabyte. Therefore, if your data plan costs no more than €38,50/month (excluding V.A.T.), a 10GB/month data limit would be allowed. The wholesale roaming charge will be gradually reduced until it reaches €2,50/GB in 2022 (at which point your plan may cost a maximum of €12,50).

Tom van der Zanden
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