Ofcom has launched a consultation on new rules for informing customers about mobile roaming arrangements.  Due to the UK's exit from the EU, at the end of June 2022, several statutory protections designed specifically to protect customers when roaming, including by increasing price transparency, fell away. Most UK networks now charge UK customers when roaming. Ofcom has been reviewing customers’ experiences of roaming (both in the EU and more widely) to understand whether customers are adequately protected from potential harms when roaming.

Its evidence indicates that, to make informed decisions about their roaming use, customers need to know when they are roaming and to have timely, clear and accurate information on roaming charges and how they can limit their spend. In addition, it shows customers continue to experience inadvertent roaming (when a customer’s device connects to a network in a different country even though the customer isn’t physically in that country) when abroad or still in the UK. This is a particular problem for customers in Northern Ireland and it can, for example, also happen on the south coast of England when phones connect to a French network.

It is consulting on new rules requiring providers to notify customers when they start roaming (both in the EU and rest of world destinations) and for that notification to include clear, comprehensible and accurate:

• personalised information on roaming charges (including specifying any fair use data limits and the time period that apply to any daily charges);
• personalised information on mobile bill limits (if the customer has one and what it is set at) and inform customers how to put one in place or amend it; and 
• where to find free to access, clear, comprehensible and accurate additional information on roaming. 

Ofcom's proposals on roaming alerts aim to ensure that customers are alerted to the fact that they are roaming, including where this is inadvertent. However, considering the potential for harm and to help protect customers from the impacts of inadvertent roaming, it is also proposing to require providers to:

• have measures in place to enable customers to reduce and/or limit expenditure related to inadvertent roaming while they are in the UK (for example, through the use of a special tariff); and

• provide clear, comprehensible and accurate information to customers about the above measures and also how to avoid inadvertent roaming in and outside of the UK, particularly in border regions.

This approach takes account of providers’ current practices such as special tariffs or treating certain roaming usage as UK usage which protects customers from the effects of inadvertent roaming while in the UK. 

Ofcom is also consulting on draft guidance on its proposed roaming rules to provide greater clarity to providers on how they can comply as well as to promote good practice. This includes examples of roaming alerts and steps that providers are already taking to help customers in Northern Ireland protect themselves from inadvertent roaming (for example, treating Ireland usage as UK usage). 

Ofcom recognises that providers already take several steps to protect customers from unexpected roaming bills, including from inadvertent roaming, and it has considered a range of options including the option of no regulation. Its provisional view is that targeted regulation, which sets out clearly Ofcom’s expectations while providing a degree of flexibility for providers (where relevant), is both appropriate and proportionate to protect the interests of customers.

The consultation ends on 28 September 2023. Ofcom plans to publish its final decision in early 2024

Which? has welcomed the proposals. There have been many proposals in the area of consumer law recently, and much of it revolves around ensuring that consumers are well informed and don't receive nasty surprises - for example the Ofcom rules around mid-contract price rises and the government's proposed changes to the laws on subscriptions on the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill.   If you are not sure that you are giving customers all the information they need, we can help to review them.