Romanian mobile operators must reduce roaming charges for calls to other EU member states and Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein, starting with July 1, to no more than EUR0.35/minute for outgoing calls and EUR0.11/minute for incoming calls, according to the Romanian telecom regulator ANCOM.

These upper limits on roaming charges do not include VAT. At the moment, the standard charges are EUR0.39/minute and EUR0.15/minute for outgoing and incoming calls, respectively, according to Mediafax newswire.

The cost to send a text message abroad remains unchanged – no more than EUR0.11 without VAT – while receiving a text message is free.

The lower charges are required per Regulation (EC) No. 717/2007 of the European Parliament and Council on roaming on public mobile telephone networks within the Community, and all Romanian mobile operators have announced they will abide by it.

The European Commission is currently revising the Regulation and a new version will be proposed in the near future, ANCOM says.

Mediafax, romania-insider.com