Calling a UK Mobile That's Abroad: Who Pays What

A customer asked O2 a simple question — if I ring a UK mobile while its owner is abroad, does it cost me extra? — and got two opposite answers from two advisers. One said it would "just simply come out of my UK allowance"; the other said there would be "an international fee". The exchange is preserved on the MoneySavingExpert forum, and it is not an isolated case. Both answers cannot be right, and the one that is right saves you from a small pile of unnecessary worry.

The rule that settles every version of this question

A forum regular put it more clearly than either adviser managed:

"Calls are charged based on the digits that you dial and where you are located when you make the call. Where that call is eventually answered is irrelevant."

That single sentence does all the work. It means "who pays what" is really two independent questions with two independent answers:

• What you pay is fixed the instant you dial, by two things only: the number's country code and the country you are standing in.
• What they pay is a separate matter between them and their own network, decided by where their handset happens to be.

Neither side's bill depends on the other side's location. Once that clicks, you can price any variation of this yourself.

The short answer, which covers most people

If you are in the UK dialling a +44 mobile, you pay your ordinary UK-to-mobile rate. It comes out of your inclusive minutes if you have them, or costs 93p a minute out of allowance on EE. It makes no difference whether that handset is in Leeds, Lisbon or Lima. There is no international rate and no hidden surcharge. That is the whole story for most readers, and you can stop here.

The person you called may be paying something to receive it. That part depends entirely on where they are.

The full matrix

The figures below are EE's, taken from its published Pay Monthly price guide (updated 12 August 2025, checked 8 August 2026), for plans taken or upgraded since 7 July 2021. O2, Vodafone and Three follow the same shape — free to receive inside their European zones, chargeable outside — but check your own network's price list for its exact rest-of-world rate.

The three rows that surprise people are the second, third and fourth. Your cost does not move at all when their phone crosses a border — but dial the wrong one of their two numbers and it moves by a factor of nearly twenty.

Trap 1: dialling their foreign number instead of their UK one

This is the expensive mistake, and it produces the angriest forum posts. One MoneySavingExpert user rang a +34 Spanish number repeatedly from Scotland, believing it was free because both people were in the UK on UK networks. The bill was £70: "I was charged £70 for making several calls to this number, NEVER being notified that I WAS BEING CHARGED A PREMIUM!" O2 offered £10 as a gesture.

Another forum member explained precisely why the charge was correct, even with both handsets in Britain: "His home network may be connecting to giffgaff whilst he is here, but if his code is 34 then they are not his provider. What is happening is that your call will go to his Spanish provider then back to the UK network that they use, hence the high cost." The number, not the person, decides where the call travels. A +34 number is a trip to Spain and back however close the two of you are standing.

If someone in your life carries a foreign SIM, settle it before the bill arrives: use a messaging app for routine contact, or ask whether they also have a UK number you can dial.

Trap 2: their voicemail answers, and it charges them

Outside Europe, the traveller pays to receive. What catches people out is that not answering is not free either — if the call rings out, voicemail answers on their behalf, and that counts as a received call. O2 customers have documented exactly this in a thread on unanswered international call charges, where calls from the UK that were never picked up still produced charges.

A phone sitting untouched in a hotel safe can therefore run up a bill, purely from calls its owner never knew about. The fix takes two minutes before flying: switch voicemail off, or turn off the divert to voicemail, so unanswered calls simply ring out.

Trap 3: you are both abroad, standing next to each other

EE's community has a recurring question about calling someone who is travelling with you, and the answer follows the same rule with no mercy. You are both in Spain; you dial their +44 mobile from three feet away. You are abroad dialling a UK number, so your roaming rules apply. They are abroad receiving a call, so their receiving rules apply. Two phones a metre apart, two separate sets of charges, for a conversation that could have happened by turning around.

When it genuinely needs to be a call — different hotels, split-up sightseeing — do it over the hotel or café Wi-Fi through any messaging app, which costs neither of you anything.

What each side should actually do

• If you are the one calling from the UK: nothing at all. Dial their +44 number and ignore the fact that they are away. Just never dial their foreign number by mistake.
• If you are the one travelling: turn on Wi-Fi Calling before you go. It routes calls to UK numbers over Wi-Fi using your normal allowance, from anywhere on earth, and sidesteps roaming entirely. Switch voicemail off. If you are heading outside Europe and expect calls, price your network's daily pass against £2.34 a minute.
• Both of you, before the trip: agree which number to use. Most of the money lost to this question is lost to dialling the wrong one.

Where CallSky fits, and where it does not

CallSky is our product, so here is the honest placement: for the question in this article's title, you probably do not need us. If you are in the UK ringing a UK mobile, you are already paying an ordinary UK rate, and no app improves on your inclusive minutes. Nothing we sell changes what a roaming traveller pays to receive a call either — only their own network's pass or Wi-Fi Calling does that.

There are two places we genuinely help. If you are the one abroad and need to make calls, doing it over hotel Wi-Fi with a calling app avoids roaming rates completely. CallSky bills in US dollars, at $0.04 a minute to UK landlines and $0.06 to UK mobiles, which is roughly 3p and 5p against EE's £2.34 outside Europe. And if you regularly call someone's foreign number from the UK — the £70 mistake above — the same call that costs £4.42 a minute on a standard tariff costs a few cents through an app. Otherwise, dial the +44 number and forget we exist.

Frequently asked questions

If I call a UK mobile that is abroad, do I pay international rates?

No. Your charge is set by the digits you dial and the country you are in, not by where the handset is. Dialling a +44 mobile from the UK is a UK call whatever country its owner is standing in, so it uses your normal allowance or your standard UK-to-mobile rate.

Does the person abroad pay to receive my call?

That depends on where they are. Within EE's European zone, receiving calls is free. In rest-of-world zones it costs £2.34 a minute without a roaming pass. Other UK networks work the same way: free to receive across Europe, chargeable beyond it.

Why was I charged for calling a Spanish number when we were both in the UK?

Because the number decides the routing, not the people. A call to a +34 number travels to the Spanish network and back to the UK, so it bills as an international call to Spain even if both handsets are in the same room.

Can Wi-Fi Calling avoid these charges?

For the traveller, yes. Wi-Fi Calling sends calls to UK numbers over a Wi-Fi connection using your ordinary UK allowance, from anywhere in the world, so no roaming charge applies. It has to be switched on before you travel, and it only helps the person who is abroad — the caller in the UK was never paying extra anyway.

CallSky lets you call 180+ countries with pay-as-you-go credit that never expires. No subscription needed.