This is the story of how I got scammed twice by European historical phone carriers, why it costed me 120€ in total, and how you can avoid being their next victim.
I use the term “scam” throughout this post because let’s be clear, that’s what it is. I don’t care that some loophole in European regulation makes the practice legal, it remains nonetheless dishonest unless much more visible and actionable warnings are set allowing us, the users, to make a choice before we are charged.
The context
Since June 15th, 2017, it has been possible to use your phone data connection across European Union countries, if your carrier is also in the EU.
Data is not unlimited. You get slightly less than at home, which is mildly annoying as one generally uses more while traveling, but given few of us spend entire months away from home, it’s generally more than sufficient.
The night, though, is full of terrors…
In other words, there are traps awaiting you, in the shape of officially sanctioned scams leading you to spend inconsiderate amounts of money with little to no chance of appeal.
Having met now two of these occurrences, and on the lookout for the third, I figured I should share my experience.
The scam at sea
I had just boarded La Suprema in the great harbor of Genova, in the direction of Palermo. As we left Genova I knew I’d have to find if a Wi-Fi connection was available as the 5G coverage would stop relatively quickly once in open sea.
It was late evening, though, so I decided to leave this task for the next morning, and went to sleep. I was on sabbatical leave, everyone I love knew I was on that ship, I didn’t need to be online, and was ready to experience the thrill of spending a few hours disconnected.
All this to explain why I was quite surprised to wake up in the morning to this message. Note the crucial mention: “not subject to EU regulation”.
Along with this TEXT was a notification from Drei, my phone carrier in Austria, that my 60€ monthly limit for roaming fees had been reached and, as such, roaming service was interrupted.
In retrospective, I am so grateful to my past self who, in a moment of lucidity many years ago, set that limit on my account in case I made a mistake. The original idea was that I could forget to turn roaming off once I left Europe, for instance when landing in the USA after connecting in Germany, which is not a random example, and leads us to the second occurrence.
The scam in the air
I live in Vienna, Austria. Ordinarily, I keep roaming turned off, and only turn it on as needed. It’s an old habit I got when living in Switzerland, on Lake Geneva, with France so close on the other shore of the lake that at times my phone would just switch networks.
Half of the time, when traveling to the USA, I fly from Vienna to Munich or Frankfurt, then from there to my overseas destination. In those occurrences, I turn roaming on during the German layover. I know it’s important to turn it back off before landing, to not incur the high roaming fees, but I also know I have at least seven hours to do so.
Hence, my surprise after boarding a flight in Munich a few months ago, when I received the T-Mobile version of the message above. Not immediately, by the way, but a while after take off, and after having spent 60€, once more.
How to beat these scams?
There is really only one approach I found: consider any means of transportation that goes far enough from land to lose regular coverage as a foreign country outside the EU.
Ships and planes for sure. The moment you are not on land anymore, a phone carrier somewhere is out to get you.
I haven’t had the problem yet on trains, but I’ll keep you posted if ever that happens to me there.
Are there any other similar situations you have encountered, where a loophole in EU regulation allowed otherwise well established companies to scam their users and go unpunished?
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