From the Guardian
The government has formally announced that UK nationals could face high roaming charges for using their mobile phones in the EU in the event of a no-deal Brexit, after the news was quietly disclosed a day earlier.
The shadow culture secretary, Tom Watson, said the possible return of roaming charges, which were abolished in 2017 around the EU, showed that ministers had opted to “cave to the lobbying might of telecoms companies rather than listen to the voice of consumers who are set to lose out”.
I knew someone in the mid-2000s who traveled around Europe on business and switched to Skype. He told me that it had cut his phone bill from around £250/month to less than £50/month. He paid £5/day for hotel wifi and then called on Skype. We did a few calls about work.
And over time, wifi went from being something cafes could sell with your coffee to something that attracted people to buy coffee. It's easy to find somewhere with free wifi.
The effect of this is that the lucrative business of charging people for roaming calls and data was disappearing. At a certain point, a company was going to figure they might as well sacrifice it for competitive advantage, which is what Three did.
Then what happened is that the EU made this law for all companies, something the companies were all going to do soon anyway, and took the credit for it, even though it was mostly about technology.
Vodafone could re-introduce roaming charges, but I'll switch provider if they do, and even if all the companies did it, I have 2 cafes where I go on holiday with wifi.
