Roaming charges can be ridiculously expensive, especially when traveling overseas, and prices for Wi-Fi access at hotels, airports, and other public locations around the world are often very high. The rates I've ended up paying have ranged from just expensive (after spending over $20 for Wi-Fi access at the Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris) to the absurd (when Vodaphone charged me hundreds of dollars to use my Blackberry in Ireland to check e-mail and browse the Internet intermittingly for a week).

To make matters worse, the poor customer service that you get when you call a mobile provider for detailed information about roaming charges for voice and data communications is far from clear, whether it's or Vodaphone in Europe.

A good practice is to when traveling overseas and rely on your PC for all communications, including voice connections. You can do this with Skype (in France at least, you have to use your PC for Skype because mobile phone carriers lock phones against Skype).

After offering affordable voice communications for International calls and free voice, chat, and video connections over the Internet between PCs for years , Skype has formed an agreement with Wi-Fi providers so you can pay with Skype credits for Internet access while on the road.

The announcement might not mean much if Skype charged gouge rates for Wi-Fi connections at , but it looks like Skype is attempting to offer an affordable alternative. Skype says prices will start at 6 cents per minute, which is very reasonable, especially in Asia and Europe. Skype has offered the service in beta form through Boingo since 2009, but now you should also be able to benefit from the more reasonable Wi-Fi connection prices abroad, where connectivity can command some hefty fees (especially taking the deflated dollar into account).