From May 15, 2019 the cost of roaming calls and sending SMS has decreased for all users. Here's what changes
New for users who travel a lot abroad and use roaming to call and send messages: from May 15 the cost of calls from your Italian number to a number of a country belonging to the EU will cost much less. The decision has been taken by the European Union and is part of the new "roaming like at home" rules that have allowed users to use the thresholds of their phone subscriptions when traveling in Europe.
The new tariffs provide for a maximum charge of 19 euro cents per minute (+VAT) for calls and 6 cents (+VAT) for sending an SMS. The new rules apply only to private users and not to business phones. The new prices applied by the EU are much lower than the previous ones: for calls you could get to spend up to 3 times more, while the cost of SMS was practically double.
What is roaming like at home
Roaming like at home is the European Union regulation that came into force in 2017 and significantly lowered the cost of roaming. Users to make calls and surf when they are in Europe can use the thresholds of their phone subscription, with some limits. If the phone plan includes unlimited calls, unlimited SMS and 30GB of Internet for 10 euros, when they are in one of the European countries they can call and send messages without problems, while for data they have a little more than 3GB available (the calculation depends on the formula "cost of the tariff (excluding VAT): 6 (cost of a gigabyte abroad) x 2").
The new ceiling for calls and SMS fits into this groove and goes to favor all users who call a lot abroad. The objective of the European Union is to protect European citizens and establish clearer rules. Now it will be up to individual operators to warn users of the change on the prices of roaming calls and SMS.