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EE thinks I'm roaming in Ireland and Jersey when I am not.

nosignalbox
Valued Contributor
Valued Contributor

‎14-05-2025 07:03 AM

I live in West Wales.  

I regularly get a text..."Hi from EE, welcome to Ireland" when I am still at home.

This doesn't worry me too much as I  believe that there is no extra cost involved if using my UK plan. But I don't know if this would apply to all plans.

I guess as Ireland isn't that far away I can understand the confusion as an Irish transmitter may be being detected

But occasionally I get a "Welcome to Jersey" text, while still at home. This DOES incur charges.

Hi from EE, Welcome to Jersey, you'll pay £2.47 per day to use your minutes, texts and data allowance.

Why do I get this message when Jersey is nowhere near Pembrokeshire?

More importantly how can I avoid the charges if using my phone at home?

Is there anyway of manually switching back to UK, rather than having to wait hours or days for a  "Welcome back to the UK, we hope you had a great trip! " text?

How can I recover any inappropriate charges with minimum inconvenience to myself?

 

0 Helpful
6 REPLIES 6
bristolian
EE Community Star
EE Community Star

‎14-05-2025 08:14 AM - edited ‎14-05-2025 08:15 AM

This topic rears its head sometimes, either in border locations or when weather conditions cause some RF "funnies"

In short, this occurs when your home network (EE) has no coverage but a roaming network does. It's certainly unusual to receive a Channel Islands network in west Wales, but not impossible - there were a few cases during the warmer periods last year too.

The welcome text message is doing its job by warning you of this, and your phone should regain EE coverage as soon as it's available. The ways of avoiding this are..

1: Use flight mode on your phone to not have any mobile coverage, or use manual network selection to only use EE-UK. The danger of the latter,  is that any & every time you lose coverage for more than a few minutes, you will have to manually reselect once service is restored.

2: In combination with flight mode, use WiFi-calling to continue using your phone at home.

The Channel Islands are part of EE's EU-zone for roaming.

nosignalbox
Valued Contributor
Valued Contributor
In response to bristolian

‎14-05-2025 08:44 AM

Thank you.

It is quite a regular occurrence, 4 times in last two months.

The problem is exacerbated as I do not always get the "welcome back to UK"
text.
This week I have had two "welcome to Ireland" texts days apart with no
apparent return between.

Switching to flight mode loses most functionality, and presumably will stop
any "welcome back" texts showing when normal service resumes.

So I will be unsure whether normal service has resumed or not.

WiFi calling is not always an available option if out and about.

It just seems wrong if I am paying for a service that is unavailable, and
concerning when I am unsure whether normal service has resumed or not.
0 Helpful
bristolian
EE Community Star
EE Community Star
In response to nosignalbox

‎14-05-2025 09:04 AM

@nosignalbox wrote:

WiFi calling is not always an available option if out and about.

It just seems wrong if I am paying for a service that is unavailable, and
concerning when I am unsure whether normal service has resumed or not.

I mentioned WiFi-calling as an option indoors.

As I mentioned previously, this only occurs in a scenario where your home network has no coverage but a roaming network does - home networks will always take priority.  Not sure what you mean by paying for a service that's unavailable, except to reinforce the scenario of why this occurs - and that warmer spells of weather can cause some freak radio conditions!

You could also disable the free roaming facility, and ensure you only enable it when you travel abroad.

nosignalbox
Valued Contributor
Valued Contributor
In response to bristolian

‎14-05-2025 09:24 AM

What I meant was that it seems wrong paying my contract for the UK service when it is unavailable.  If I have to enable flight mode I lose most functionality. 

When the welcome to Jersey situation arises ( just checked -  6 times to Jersey in 8 months last year ), there is always a risk of inadvertently  (or intentionally in emergency) using the phone, and picking up charges. This seems unfair when not travelling. 

The situation is exacerbated if there isn't always a welcome back text. But so far, for me, this has only happened with my "trips" to Ireland!

 

 

0 Helpful
Michael_D
EE Community Support Team
In response to nosignalbox

‎14-05-2025 10:04 AM

Hi @nosignalbox 

If you do see that it comes up with another country, you can try to manually change the network back to EE, which will prevent any possible roaming costs.

Michael

bristolian
EE Community Star
EE Community Star
In response to nosignalbox

‎14-05-2025 11:17 AM

@nosignalbox wrote:

What I meant was that it seems wrong paying my contract for the UK service when it is unavailable.

I suspected as much. If EE service is unavailable in a particular location, the only other option is to use WiFi-calling indoors... but if you're outdoors, in a coverage hole, then your phone won't have any UK service in any case.

I'll re-emphasise the scenario where this occurs - your home network has no coverage but a roaming network does. Anytime your home network has coverage, your phone will reselect it. A few minutes of overlap can be expected at each end of the cycle - so from losing coverage of EE-UK to finding a foreign network, and equally from EE-UK becoming available again, to your phone spotting it.

You're absolutely right on the charging implications, it's one reason why Eire roaming charges have been zero-rated for a few years now. Technically, it's just something that happens in border locations but can also happen in freak weather conditions.. there's no malice in it.