Mobile operator Orange Poland has launched its new Go Europe service, which enables customers to use their existing subscriptions to make calls and send SMS texts while traveling within Europe, for PLN 4.90 (US $1.47) per day. Incoming calls from all EU states are free.

Tarifica’s Take

Telecom New Zealand will extend its NZD 10 (US $7.77) flat daily rate for mobile roaming to four new countries – Japan, Singapore, Korea and France – starting 1 July. The operator will also retain its NZD 6 ($4.66) daily roaming rate for Australia, which was introduced in December 2012 and has received a positive response from customers.

As economies begin to pick up and people travel more for business and pleasure, roaming rates are becoming of greater important and relevance, so it is in operators’ interest to develop more roaming plans for both their regions and the wider world. But customers are becoming much more vigilant and proactive about their mobile costs, a trend consistent with what we have been seeing recently in the rise of ever-more-diverse and high-end prepaid plans. Even power users, who not long ago might have been price insensitive, are now insisting that their bills contain no surprises. Therefore, we think daily flat-rate roaming plans, such as those introduced by Orange Poland and Telecom NZ, are the way to go.