England manager Roy HodgsonAP

England fans heading to Euro 2012 in Ukraine and Poland at the start of next month could run up thousands of pounds in mobile phone bills if they are not careful.

This is because Ukraine is outside the EU. Were England to reach the final, fans could end up with eye-watering bills of over £5,500 – more than 11 times the cost of the best tickets (€600 or £482) to the final.

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A report from uSwitch found that football fans could easily fork out £35 a day just for making calls, retrieving voicemail and sending texts while in Ukraine for the nine days between 11 and 19 June when England play their pool matches.

Using the internet would drive your bills much higher. Daily data bills could hit £228 if mobile users don't use free local Wi-Fi and keep their phone's data roaming switched off. Altogether, that means fans face a total daily phone bill of £262 for calls, texts and data usage.

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Within eurozone countries, mobile phone networks have been forced to cap roaming charges at 35p per minute to make calls, 11p per minute to receive calls and 11p to send a standard text message. There is also a €50 limit on data, with these caps set to fall further from 1 July. But unfortunately this does not apply to countries outside the EU.

And with data-hungry smartphones more popular than ever, the collective cost of using apps, streaming videos, surfing the web and making and receiving calls could leave England fans facing a four-digit bill when they return. Based on average costs across the five major networks, using a mobile phone in Ukraine to make and receive just two five-minute phone calls per day, listen to a two-minute voicemail message and send five text messages and one photo message would result in an average bill of £35 per day.

But it's the cost of data that could see football fans scoring an own goal, especially with 1MB of mobile internet data in Ukraine costing an average of £6.10 across the five major networks.

Ernest Doku, technology expert at uSwitch.com, says: "Watching England might be priceless, but using your mobile phone abroad isn't. Footie fans have to think ahead as using their phones while following England could add more than £5k to what is likely to be an already expensive trip."

How to prevent a 'bill shock own goal'
The first thing England fans going to Ukraine – or indeed anyone taking a holiday outside the EU – should do is talk to their network. They may be able to advise a bundle, or at least let you know the costs involved with using your phone abroad. Those using their phone can help to limit the damage by keeping data roaming switched off as much as possible.

While the networks offer money-saving bundles that will slash smartphone costs in the EU, there are limited options for Ukraine. Vodafone's Data Traveller package offers England fans in Ukraine 25MB of data for £5, which customers must opt into, and Orange offers calls and texts at a 30% discount for £5.10. Orange customers can also buy a 10MB data bundle for £15.32 per month or 50MB for £61.27 for use in Ukraine.

At the moment, O2 and Vodafone are the only networks that places an automatic cap on data usage worldwide for pay monthly customers and O2, Orange and Vodafone all send text alerts so customers can keep track of their data spend. T-Mobile plans to introduce a new system to prevent customers from running up unexpected data bills abroad and hopefully this will be in place before Euro 2012 kicks off.

Local SIM card
When it comes to calls and text messages, the best way to keep costs down to an absolute minimum is to buy a local SIM card, put it in your phone and top it up. Those mobile users wanting to go online should be on the ball and use free Wi-Fi where possible.

10 things we hate about our banks

  • 1. PPI
    <p> More than 46,000 of 106,000 the complaints received by the FOS in the second half of last year related to payment protection insurance (PPI). And the organisation is expecting to receive a record 165,000 PPI complaints in 2012/2013.</p> <p> The huge numbers are due to the PPI mis-selling scandal that should now be a thing of the past, but there is no doubt that the insurance, which can add thousands to the cost of a loan, is highly unpopular!</p> <div> </div> <div> (Pictured: Martin Lewis after the PPI payout ruling)</div>
    1. PPI
  • 2. Mortgages
    <p> Complaints about mortgages jumped by 38% in the last six months of last year, the FOS figures show, compared to an increase of just 5% in investment-related complaints.</p> <p> Common gripes about mortgages include the exit penalties imposed should you want to sell up or change you mortgage before a fixed or discounted deal comes to an end, and the high arrangement fees charged by many lenders.</p> <div> </div>
    2. Mortgages
  • 3. Savings rates
    <p> While there is nothing in the data released by the FOS about the number of complaints relating to savings accounts, hard-pressed savers have been struggling with low interest rates for several years now.</p> <p> You can get up to 3.10% with Santander's easy-access eSaver account, but many older accounts are paying 1.00% or less and even this market-leading offer includes a 12-month bonus of 2.60% - meaning that the rate will plummet to just 0.50% after the first year.</p>
    3. Savings rates
  • 4. Borrowing rates
    <p> Banks are imposing the highest authorised overdraft interest rates since records began, with today's borrowers paying an average of 19.47%, according to the Bank of England.</p> <p> A typical Briton with an overdraft of &pound;1,000 is therefore forking out around &pound;200 in interest charges alone. Coupled with meagre returns on savings, it's enough to make your blood boil!</p>
    4. Borrowing rates
  • 5. Penalty charges
    <p style="text-align: left;"> While authorised overdrafts may seem expensive, going into the red without permission will cost you even more due to huge penalty fees.</p> <p style="text-align: left;"> Barclays, for example, charges &pound;8 (up to a maximum of &pound;40 a day) each time that there is not enough money in your account to cover a payment.</p>
    5. Penalty charges
  • 6. International transfer charges
    <p> If you need to send money abroad, the likelihood is that your bank will impose transfer charges - and offer you a poor rate of exchange. Someone transferring a five-figure sum could easily lose out by &pound;500 or more as a result.</p> <p> The good news, however, is that you can often get a better deal by using a currency specialist such as Moneycorp.</p>
    6. International transfer charges
  • 7. Waiting on the phone
    <p> <span style="text-align: left; ">Automated telephone banking systems, not to mention call centres in far-flung parts of the world, are one of our top gripes - especially as we often encounter them when we are already calling to report a problem.</span></p> <p> In the words of one disgruntled customer: &quot;What is it about telephone banking that turns me into Victor Meldrew? Well, maybe it's the fourteen security questions, maybe it's the range of products that they try to push or maybe it's because I'm forced to listen to jazz funk at full volume while my phone bill soars.</p> <div> </div> <div> &quot;Actually though, I think it's because the people I eventually speak to rarely seem able to solve the issue I'm calling about.&quot;</div>
    7. Waiting on the phone
  • 8. Being treated like a number
    <p> The days of a personal relationship with your bank manager are long gone - for the huge majority of us at least.</p> <p> When ethical Triodos Bank investigated recently why around 9 million Britons would not recommend their banks to a friend or relative, it found that almost a third felt they were not treated as individuals. Another 40%, meanwhile, were simply disappointed with the customer service they received.</p> <div> </div>
    8. Being treated like a number
  • 9. Long queues in branches
    <p> <span style="text-align: left; ">When you're in a rush, the last thing you want to do is wait in a long queue at your local branch.</span></p> <p> Researchers at consumer champion Which? recently found that most people get seen within 12 minutes, but you could have a much longer wait if you go in at a busy time. Frustrating stuff!</p> <div> </div>
    9. Long queues in branches
  • 10. Bankers' bonuses
    <p> The Triodos Bank research also indicated that the bonus culture that ensured the bank's high-flying employees received large salaries, even when it was making a loss at the taxpayer's expense, was hugely unpopular with consumers.</p> <p> About a quarter of those who would not recommend their current banks said this was the main reason why. And with RBS executives sharing a &pound;785 million bonus pool despite the bank, which is 82% publicly owned, making a loss of &pound;2 billion last year, it's not hard to see why.</p>
    10. Bankers' bonuses


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Network

Cost per minute to make a call

Cost per minute to receive a call

Cost to send a text message

Cost to send photo message

Cost to retrieve a voicemail

Cost for mobile internet

O2

£1.20 to UK and £1.79 to rest of world

85p

40p

26p

Same rate as a call to the UK, so £1.20 per minute

£6 per MB (A maximum charge of £40 a month will be applied and they will also send the customer text alerts at £20).

Vodafone

£1.65

£1.30

35p plus standard plan charge for sending UK text message

37p

Not specified – taken as £1.65 (same as cost of making a call)

£3 per MB for the first 5MB. £15 for every 5MB after that. (In MB increments per day, UK time)

T-Mobile

£1.50

£1.50

40p to UK, 50p to non-UK

20p

£1.50

£7.50 per MB

Orange

£1.30

70p

40p

60p up to 49.9kb or 75p over 50kb

£1.30

£8 per MB

Three

£3.00

£1.25

35p

25p to UK numbers & 35p to non-UK numbers

Not specified –taken as £3 (same as cost of making a call)

£6 per MB

Average across 5 providers

£1.79

£1.12

39p

36p

£1.73

£6.10

Pay monthly