Battery life of a user equipment (UE) can be extended when the UE is roaming internationally in a country that has multiple carrier networks each utilizing multiple public land mobile network (PLMN) identifiers. Scan control tables, stored in a universal integrated circuit card (UICC) of the UE, are populated with the identifiers of a PLMN having the highest priority in a defined area (e.g., Circle). A roaming control applet of the UICC can compare serving cell data with the scan control tables to determine if the UE is to perform a higher priority (HP) PLMN search. Utilization of the scan control table avoids unnecessary searches for HPPLMNs that are unavailable in the UE's current location and accordingly extends battery life of the UE.