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Understand roaming charges and data caps
Learn how to manage your data while you're travelling overseas. You can control the amount of data you use while you're travelling by setting data caps.
How roaming data caps work
- If you're a Pay Monthly or business customer, a default cap of $150 will be set for your mobile number. This excludes Spark Digital customers.
- This cap is for casual roaming data rates only and doesn’t apply to roaming pack usage
- If you reach that cap, you'll no longer be able to do anything that uses data. We'll text you at 80% and 100% to let you know that you've reached your cap. The text will have a link you can select to increase your data cap.
- The cap only applies to data that you use when you're roaming. Restrictions don't apply to calls you make or texts you send while overseas.
How mobile plans affect roaming packs and roaming data caps
Pay Monthly plans
- You'll receive an alert when you reach 80% of your data cap
- This alert will let you know how much you've spent on roaming data to date
- The start of the billing month signals a reset in your data cap
Prepaid plans
- You'll get charged on a pay-as-you-go basis
- The amount of credit you have on your phone will determine the data you can use
- The start of the next calendar month signals a reset in your data cap
Reaching your roaming data cap
We'll send you a text to let you know you've reached your data cap. You'll no longer be able to use anything that uses data. This includes:
- Browsing the internet
- Syncing email
- Downloading or uploading files
- Sending or receiving MMS (you'll still get notifications)
You may be able to access zero-rated websites. These websites work like toll-free calls, and you don't get charged to use them. But when you're outside of New Zealand, there may still be a charge to use some websites that are normally zero-rated.
Increasing or decreasing your roaming data cap on the Spark app
- Tap on the Products tab
- Select the Pay Monthly mobile you want to set up the data cap limit for
- Scroll down to Roaming and you'll see the current limit in $NZ dollars
- Tap Change to set the new limit
- Select Set a new limit or Go unlimited
- Select the limit from the bar and tap Confirm
- Your new limit will be displayed in the product details under Roaming
- Setting the limit to unlimited means charges will incur without restriction.
- Setting roaming data caps is available for Pay Monthly mobiles only. It is not available for Prepaid mobiles.
Increasing or decreasing your roaming data cap on MySpark
- To set your data cap before you leave New Zealand, open this link on your phone and follow the steps: Go to m.spark.co.nz/rsc
- If you got a data usage text from us, select the link in the text and follow the steps
Note: You can increase your data cap at any time. You can only decrease it if you haven't reached your current data cap.
You can also set your data cap by following these steps:
- Go to spark.co.nz/myspark
- Sign in using your email address and password (or create an account first)
- Select View plan and extras
- Select My settings
- Select Open
- Scroll down to Roaming data limit and select Change
- Select Update data limit
- A pop-up box will appear. Confirm the changes and agree to the terms and conditions.
- Select Yes to update your changes
- Select OK on the message that appears
After you've changed your data cap, you'll need to restart your device. If you don't, it can take up to an hour to update.
See how much data you've used
Sign in to MySpark on your mobile's web browser:
- Go to m.spark.co.nz/yt
- Sign in using your mobile number and password (or register first)
- On the screen that appears, you'll be able to see how much of your data cap you have used.
Data usage alerts
- We'll text you to let you know when you've used 80% and 100% of your data cap. We'll also text you if you're using more data than usual.
- You can't turn off these texts
- Texts are sent based on New Zealand Standard Time.
- If you're using an iPad or tablet the default data smart caps apply. These devices can't receive text alerts. If you want to receive the text alerts, set them up to go to your mobile number or an email address. Visit MySpark on your iPad or tablet to do this. Go to spark.co.nz/myspark
- The device you are using must be able to send text messages in order for you to receive the roaming data cap alerts.
Other types of alerts
While you're roaming, we'll send you text alerts to tell you about the data, texts or minutes you're using. The alerts you may get from us include:
- A welcome text when you arrive at your destination
- A text with helpful tips and links to assist you when roaming
- Up to three casual data usage alerts. These alerts will let you know when you reach 2MB, 60MB and 100MB.
- Roaming Pack usage alerts. If you're in a place covered by Spark's Roaming Pack, you'll get a text when you reach 80% and 100% of your pack inclusions.
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