[gerald_sheils]

A cautionary tale ....

I had a query about some international calls I had made while overseas on my Vodafone pay monthly phone.

It turns out that the much maligned 'old' system of being charged the charges from the network operator where you make the call, plus a 10-15% handling charge, has been replaced by 'much easier to understand' flat rate bands.

The pay monthly and pay as you go rates are now essentially the same (on pay monthly there are discounts for some Vodafone european networks, for an exrtra charge).

I used to make the odd call (from the middle east to Canada). They used to cost around 65p a minute (depending on the time of day and the exchange rate).

They now cost a staggeringly 'easy to understand' flat rate of 195p per minute.

The actual network charges where I make the calls are unchanged at around 50p a minute.

I'm doing my bit now for Vodafone, to help make calculating my roaming call charges as simple as possible. None at all.