ROAMING TO ISRAEL FOR UK

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Keeping your local sim has its advantages. Comfort-wise. There IS a discomfort in switching domestic sim and resetting your speed dials, sim saved contacts and data settings. You want to do your best to keep your usual card, the familiar layouts and shortcuts. Not to mention this way you will not miss any calls. And having your old card you won’t have to store or memorize new contact numbers to keep in touch with the new mobile operator in case of tech issues or questions.

If you are traveling from the United Kingdom compare below the roaming plans from UK operators not to return home to massive roaming bills.

Below roaming rates are valid in a number of countries including Israel.

UK ROAMING TO ISRAEL INTERNATIONAL PLANS

The UK has 4 network operators (that is not to count various MVNOs):

* EE (for Everything Everywhere, by British Telecom)

* Vodafone UK

* 3 (Three by Hutchison)

* Virgin Media O₂ (by Virgin Media and Telefónica) – *no roaming to Israel*

EE ROAMING TO ISRAEL

EE (formerly Everything Everywhere) is a British mobile network operator and internet service provider, which is a brand within the BT Group. EE was founded in 2010. EE is the second-largest mobile network operator in the United Kingdom, with 26.1 million subscribers as of September 2021

EE’s international plans a

World Select Talk and Text
Travel Data Pass

World Select Talk and Text: For those Pay Monthly customers who travel to Israel EE is offering an international roaming plan with below charge rates:

Includes:

Making calls – £1.88 per minute
Receiving calls – £1.88 per minute
Texting – 62p per text
Receiving text – free
Sending a picture message – 67p per picture message
Voice mail – To receive a voicemail you’ll be charged at the receive a call per-minute rate above. To save a voicemail you’ll be charged at the making a call per-minute rate above.

Does not include:
Data and Internet – Data add-on package is purchase separately, to use data on your phone in these countries, choose a standard data pass or a Travel Data Pass

Travel Data Pass

Travel Data Pass gives data allowance for a fixed daily price, so there’s no need to hunt for WiFi and no chance of an unexpected bill when you get home.

For Pay Monthly Customers

stay connected with 500MB of data for £5.02 a day in Canada and the USA
get 500MB of data for £6.27 a day in nine countries incl. Australia, India and China
use 150MB of data for £6.27 a day in 45 other destinations including Israel or

For Pay as You Go Customers

40 MB for £4
100 MB for £7
250 MB for £20 (check out latest rates)

BUNDLES

EE’s Bundle Options for roaming in Israel

Travelers can get separate roaming bundles for traveling to Israel.

Here are your bundle options (as of December 2021):

Data – choose from the options EE texts you when you land or stick to WI-FI to save some money. EE will not allow you to use data off WI-FI without a data bundle, so don’t worry you won’t end up with data charges if no bundle is bought. So you have time to pick a data add-on without being charged for accidental usage.

Calls – 30 mins £6.00, 60 mins £10.00 OR 120 mins £20.00 (mins will be used when making and receiving calls/voicemails).

Texts – 100 texts £6.00 OR 250 texts £10.00 (texts will be used when sending as free to receive).

All bundles are per month, so you will need to cancel when back in the UK so they don’t roll on. Please keep an eye on your usage as you may not receive text updates on your allowances!

RATES WITHOUT ROAMING PLAN

Making/receiving calls £1.80 per minute.
Sending text 60p per text.
48p per picture message
Receiving text is free.
Data is available only per data add-on

VODAFONE ROAMING TO ISRAEL

Vodafone Limited is a British telecommunications services provider, and a part of Vodafone Group Plc, the world’s second-largest mobile phone company. Vodafone is the third-largest mobile network operator in the United Kingdom, with 16.9 million subscribers as of November 2021, after EE and O2, followed by Three

Vodafone has been making updates to its tariff plans and roaming packages which go with the plan. Vodafone charges £6 per day to use UK allowance of data, minutes and texts abroad if user qualifies to one of the below:

Vodafone Roaming

Pay monthly plan taken before 11 August 2021
Limited data Xtra plan with 4 Xtra benefits
Unlimited data Xtra plan with 4 Xtra benefits
Pay monthly plans taken from 11 August 2021 aside from those with 4 Xtra benefits and Vodafone Basics
Unlimited Max plan taken between 12 July 2019 and 14 June 2021
Red Entertainment Plan taken between 4 September 2018 and 11 July 2019

Except for Vodafone Basics Plans

All unlimited data plans come with a data threshold of 25GB a month when roaming.

That is to say Unlimited Lite, Unlimited or Unlimited Max plan abroad, allow to use up to 25GB of data a month without any additional charges.

However customers may need to buy more roaming data. In this case buy as much as you like at:

£3.65 for 1GB
£18.25 for 5GB

If you don’t have Xtra plan to use your UK allowance of data, minute and texts when youa roaming for a daily fee of £6 then you Pay as You Go (options for Israel)

Making calls 60 p per minute
Receiving calls 36 p per minute
Sending text 8p per text.
Picture messages 66p per picture message
Data usage 12 p per MB

THREE ROAMING TO ISRAEL

Three UK was founded in 2003. Three is a global brand name owned by Hutchison 3G Enterprises S.A.R.L., under which several UMTS-based mobile phone networks and broadband internet providers operate in Hong Kong, Macau, Austria, Denmark, Indonesia, Ireland, Sweden and the United Kingdom. The brand was founded in 2002 in Hong Kong

When you Go Roam Around the World, it’s £5 a day.* You won’t need to pay for this until 23 May 2022, as we’re waiving the charge until then. If you’re on Pay As You Go, or your Pay Monthly plan started before 1 October 2021, these charges won’t apply.

Three has two options for its roaming customers:

Go Roam Roaming
Pay As You Go

Go Roam Roaming

Go Roam works automatically when you arrive in a Go Roam destination as long as data roaming is switched on in your device’s settings. Go Roam is for customers who are using a monthly plan.Each monthly plan will gives an allowance of call minutes, SMS and data which can be used in roaming by activating a Go Roam option for £5 a day

Service	With allowance remaining	Outside your allowance
Calling a UK number	Comes out of your allowance	3p per minute
Calling an Israeli number	£1.40 per minute ^†	£1.40 per minute ^†
Texts to UK	Comes out of your allowance	2p per text
Texting an Israeli number	Up to 2p per text	Up to 2p per text
Receiving calls from any number	Free	Free
Receiving texts from any number	Free	Free
Using internet and data	Comes out of your allowance	1p per MB (up to £45 Data roaming limit)
Using voicemail	Comes out of your allowance	3p per minute

RATES WITHOUT ROAMING PLAN – Pay As You Go

If subscibers don’t have a specific roaming package or pass charging rate of $0.25/minute voice calls will apply, $0.5 for texting and $15/MB in case of traveling to Israel.

Service	With allowance remaining	Outside your allowance
Calling a UK number	10p per minute	10p per minute
Calling an Israeli number	£1.40 per minute ^†	£1.40 per minute ^†
Texts to UK	10p per text	10p per text
Texting an Israeli number	35p per text	35p per text
Receiving calls from any number	Free	Free
Receiving texts from any number	Free	Free
Using internet and data	5p per MB	5p per MB (up to £45 Data roaming limit)
Using voicemail	10p per minute	10p per minute

PRICE COMPARISON BETWEEN ALL UK MOBILE OPERATORS

UK Mobile Operator	Roaming Israel Price	What is Included	Cost Without Roaming Plan
			VOICE	SMS	DATA
EE	£6.27	Data roaming 150MB/day	£1.80	60p	–
Vodafone UK	£6	Allowance of Xtra plan minutes & text.	60p/36p(making/receiving call)	8p	12p/MB
Three	£5	Allowance of your mobile plan minutes & text.	10p/min (UK number)£1.40/min(Israeli number)	10p (UK)35p (Israel)	5p per MB (up to £45 Data roaming limit)

Keeping the domestic sim during travel of course has its advantages from the view point of familiarity and usage habits but roaming after all is roaming and it is an expensive connection type with many interconnection charges among operators. And in the end roaming is the biggest income source for any mobile network operator.

Here are a few hints to minimize your roaming charges:

Keep SMS under 160 characters where possible. Every 160 characters count as a text. So, if you send a text longer than this, you will get charged for multiple text messages.
Turn off “Wi-Fi Assist” (for iphone users). iPhones have a feature which may use your data even when you’re connected to Wi-Fi. Turn it off.
Use wifi points where possible to save your MBs for when you walking around

To pick an operator for roaming consider your roaming needs. Will you predominantly make calls? Local calls? International calls? Or texting? Uploading and downloading? Pick the operator with the lowest rates for your preferred service.

Or pick a Pay As You Go roaming from the current provider, to use for a day or two until you get settled and get a sim from a local sim shop. Or order a local sim card delivered for free to you while you are still at home and have an English speaking customer service by your side 24/7 while you are traveling.