How to keep your mobile bills down at home and abroad

theguardian.com:

It is getting more expensive to stay in touch, with many mobile phone users facing higher bills in the coming months – especially if they plan to go on holiday.

Virgin Mobile customers will see an annual price rise of 3.9% above January’s RPI inflation rate for calls – currently prices increase in line with the RPI index – while Tesco Mobile pay-monthly customers face price rises from 9 February for sending picture messages, calling internationally, and adding more data to their plans.

Meanwhile this year Vodafone, EE and Three plan to bring in a £2-a-day roaming charge for those travelling to Europe – potentially leading to heavy bills for families after two weeks in the sun.

So how can you save money while staying mobile?

Buying a bundled deal, where the phone and the contract come together, means you could miss out on better deals if the two are taken separately.

With O2, you can buy a new iPhone 13 on a 24-month contract with 150GB of data and unlimited calls and texts, for just under £50 a month – £28 of which is for data and calls.

But if you were to buy the phone separately, you could get a sim-only deal with O2 for £15 with 100GB of data. This also means you can choose the length of time you commit to a contract, usually from one month onwards.

There are numerous sites where the best deals can be compared: MoneySavingExpert, Uswitch and GoCompare among them.

Shelling out large amounts for a new mobile will not possible for everyone, however. Apple operates an iPhone upgrade programme through its stores when the cost of one of the phones can be spread over 20 months.

A 0% credit card allows you to roll out the price – Barclaycard currently has one for up to 24 months, while the M&S card runs up to 23 months.

However,