While many mobile tariffs include data roaming clauses to help make European travel affordable, people embracing remote working are finding themselves caught out by the Fair Usage Statement.

European roaming clauses are designed for periodic travel, typically holidays, short breaks or the occasional business trip. They are not designed for extended periods of travel, working abroad, or living overseas.

It might be tempting to take your mobile and laptop with you, but just make sure it isn’t leaving you or your team out of pocket.

Here’s an example clause from one of our suppliers:

Fair usage statement

“You may use our services in our Europe Zone for periodic travel only, like business travel, holidays or short breaks. If you’re not genuinely using our services for periodic travel, we may have to charge you for, or suspend you from, using our services in our Europe Zone.”

What to avoid

“If a connection breaches 60 days of EU roaming in a rolling 120 days then there will be an additional charge of £4 per day for each day that the connection roams in EU within the calendar month, until the number of days roaming reduces to under 60 days in a rolling 120 days. We reserve the right to disconnect repeat offenders of this fair use policy.”