Is it time to subscribe to a printer service from HP?

Ever since my dad brought home an...

What’s the best way of buying a phone today?

How did you buy your latest phone?...

MWC: What device highlights did you miss?

So, early last week I predicted that...

Getting anything done on a Vodafone connection is proving rather difficult nowadays

How are you getting on with Vodafone? It’s subjective, I know, but I’m having real trouble with the company’s network capabilities. Whether I’m in the centre of London or in the middle of rural Hampshire, the performance appears to be universally abysmal.

It wasn’t always this way. I used to get pretty decent throughput more or less anywhere in the UK.

Now, it feels like I’m getting a degraded service. If I had to characterise it, I’d say that it’s now like using a ‘good’ GRPS connection.

I haven’t bothered looking at actual network speeds with the various speed ratings apps. I care far more about how quickly things download, how quickly my phone responds to basic things like loading a webpage or updating an app.

Increasingly I have turned to depending on my EE connection principally through the MiFi unit I’ve been using on long term test from the company. The 4G connectivity is far, far superior to anything Vodafone currently offer me. My iPad Mini runs my own personal EE connection and as a consequence I often don’t use my iPhone or BlackBerry (both on Vodafone) because I consciously choose the iPad with the LTE label top left (i.e. 4G). I’m never disappointed.

The one exception to this experience is my 3 handset. I still find their connectivity pretty good across the board. I just haven’t plucked up the courage to swap away from Vodafone yet.

It’s coming though.

What is your experience of the networks at the moment? How are you getting on with your contract(s)?

8 COMMENTS

  1. It’s a shame you’re seeing bad speed with Big Red. I’ve had a mobile contract with 3 for just over a year now, have had mobile broadband for nearly two. I’ve seen speeds improve big time. And now I have a HTC one. I can average between 8 – 23mbps. Usually around 12-18 most of the time though. I only left Vodafone cos they couldn’t give me data I needed, EE is expanding here, would love to give it a go but it’s price! Recently had a temp O2 SIM, just to activate my 2nd phone which is an iphone5 and their 3G network’s still patchy and painfully slow around Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan. But their net and customer service has always been shocking. The iPhone now lives on 3Ireland making use of 3Like Home, as I need a cheap way of calling my friends in Ireland as UK makes it really expensive to communicate with people in other countries. But that’s another story I Wont go into!

  2. The throughput is poor & I do wonder if this is down to backhaul congestion. They’re currently tendering for a new microwave network & their C&W acquisition means they can

  3. Last year, after 2 years of Vodafone, I extended my contract by another year in exchange for a very low monthly payment.

    Since then I seem to have nothing but trouble: phone going off net, voicemail when the phone never rang etc. I have had a new SIM, then the wrong size SIM. I’ve even had my Nexus 4 replaced partly because I couldn’t be sure it wasn’t the phone. The problems come and go.

    Vodafone have been pretty hopeless, the people in the call centre barely seem able to understand the problem. The local shop is either too busy or the person I need to speak to is off that day.

    In a few months I’ll try SIMs from a few different providers, choose one and blank Vodafone out of my consciousness forever.

  4. Timing is everything. Today I emailed the ‘director’s office’ asking if they were persecuting the parent of a terminally ill child as policy, or through ineptness. The whole omnishambles is dissertation length, but the headlines are rude, lying and abusive bangaloreans failing to understand or communicate when I detail billing that has never been correct. The universal paucity of coverage is almost the least of my worries. But if a company thinks its ok to steal £8 billion from us, they will be capable of anything.

  5. Recently it’s been absolutely terrible – Friday was a particular low in central London. I’m a Foursquare addict, so I notice network problems more than most.

    I travel between Newbury and London (two of the most important locations for Big Red in the world) every day and I lose connection anywhere between three and six times per trip. Paddington is particularly bad anywhere near rush hour.

    It has to be a capacity thing, but surely they should be carpet bombing major transit hubs like Paddington with boosters et al?! Soho on Friday was awful too.

    I run a small/medium size business and we have more than a dozen connections from Voda. But not for long.

  6. I live in sunny Vauxhall (Thorne Road to be exact) I find either in my house or on the street the reception I get for Vodafone is very bad to the extent the caller cannot hear me, I cannot hear them or the call ends suddenly, My partner has the same issue. I am on android she is on apple iphone. Any way they charge enough for calls etc and I cannot understand why we have to put up with such a crap signal.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

Recently Published

Is it time to subscribe to a printer service from HP?

Ever since my dad brought home an HP LaserJet printer (version 3, if memory serves), I have been printing with an HP. Over the...

What’s the best way of buying a phone today?

How did you buy your latest phone? I'm asking because I'm thinking about what I should be doing. When I was living in Oman, I...

MWC: What device highlights did you miss?

So, early last week I predicted that next to nothing from Mobile World Congress would break through into the mainstream media. I was right,...

How Wireless Will Pave the Path to Neobank Profitability

I'm delighted to bring you an opinion piece from Rafa Plantier at Gigs.com. I think it's particularly relevant given the recent eSIM news from...

An end of an era: Vodafone UK turns off 3G services

I thought it was worthwhile highlighting this one from the Vodafone UK team. For so long - for what feels like years, seeing the...

Mobile World Congress: Did the mainstream media notice?

I resolved this year to make sure I wrote something - anything - about Mobile World Congress, the huge mobile industry trade show taking...