Singaporean operator StarHub has signed a deal with Vodafone, which will see its customers use mobile data services at more attractive rates when roaming to major European countries, Australia, New Zealand or South Africa.

With the new preferred rates, customers pay $25 for the first 20Mb of international data used on any particular day. Beyond this usage within the same day, roaming data access costs $3/Mb.

The operator claims that most customers will find 20Mb a sufficient amount of mobile data to use in a day when overseas. To take advantage of the savings, customers simply connect their mobile devices to Vodafone’s high-quality network in any of the 14 available overseas destinations.

The data-roaming rates are offered to travellers whilst in Albania, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Malta, Portugal, Spain, Netherlands, Turkey, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.

All StarHub Mobile post-paid customers with international roaming service will automatically enjoy the preferred rates when they roam on the selected Vodafone networks. They are not required to activate the service prior to use. Customers can also opt to be charged on a daily basis as and when it is needed.

Last week at MWC, Starhub CEO, Neil Montefiore hit out at roaming rates, saying that they´re too high and they need to come down. Montefiore said that 80 per cent of his customers disable data when overseas, and that´s probably a typical figure for the industry (Informa has put the average at 70 per cent). Too many operators are making too much money to want to rock the boat, he said, but the industry needs to see the wider opportunity. This latest move reflects that.