Wheels come off O2's data network UK operator O2 is having data network problems that are making it impossible for most users to access the internet, as well as preventing data-based applications such as MMS. Despite initial reports that the problem was down to congestion in the London area, it now seems that the whole network is refusing to carry packet data …
Try calling customer services, its great... they reel off a long script which you can tell they've been working on all afternoon...
Best part is when they say "Its at our highest priority to fix, hopefully should be in the next 24 hours..."
I can't wait to go back to Orange once this contract is up...
I called O2 a few months back to complain about crap coverage and data rates.
The guy at the call centre said "Yeah, it is crap, isn't it. That's why I'm with Orange".
I then asked him whether there were any plans to increase capacity.
"Of course not, " he said", there's a recession on. All infrastructure spending has ceased for the foreseeable future".
Well, at least he was honest.
It's processing data just fine on 2G GPRS at least with an N97 and has done all day (I could go upstairs 2 floors and get 3G to check, but can't be arsed), that's down in Devon mind...
Actually, I was thinking it was faster earlier, maybe if loads of people can't get online, the iPhone chumps won't be consuming so much....
Try this:-
To do this, do as follows:
Settings;
General;
Network;
Cellular Data Network;
Change APN from idata.o2.co.uk TO mobile.o2.co.uk
If you wish to send MMS also you need to do as follows:
Settings;
General;
Network;
Cellular Data Network;
Change MMS from idata.o2.co.uk TO wap.o2.co.uk
I've just been down the local O2 show to complain about this - they said restore the damn thing to fix it.
Now, I read this on here - how can the damn shops be so useless as not to know. Now I have to wait god knows how long for the damn thing to reload everything knowing that it still won't work anyway.
I hate O2, even more than usual today.
blinkin' well explain why I've spent all afternoon playing with every setting under the sun to get my phone working! I thought it was an issue caused by O2 forcing a "connectivity update message" on me last night! Internet and MMS that had been working for years (literally) suddenly stopped working today (well, MMS is still fubar, but I can live with that).
However, I'm online again and I've been connected for the last few hours with no problem, streaming music (so I'd notice an interruption in service). That's in Folkestone, for what it's worth...
I got my data working again by going to settings->general->network ->cellular data network
Change the APN for data from idata.o2.co.uk to mobile.o2.co.uk then turn 3G on and off and it should let you back online with your iPhone. It won't help with visualvoice mail or MMS (i don't recommend touching the APNS for them) but it will get you back online for email, web, etc.
WARNING - I've been told by O2 that by doing the above, I might get charged for any data going through the mobile.o2.co.uk APN as this isn't part of my unlimited iPhone tariff. I asked if they were being serious, one APN is down and they'll charge me if I use another working one but he said I *might* get charged.
Scoopz
I was getting the "unable to activate cellular network" message here (in Edinburgh).
The issues seem to be caused by the idata.o2.co.uk APN.
If you go into Settings->General->Network->Cellular Data Network and change the APN for Cellular Data from "idata.o2.co.uk" back to the old "mobile.o2.co.uk", then it works fine.
Other O2 customers are reporting the same thing on their own forums:
http://forum.o2.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=23767
But O2 are recommending against this change (via twitter) for some reason.
I'm in Leeds here and it has been flaky all day. Unable to connect in to works VPN on the iphone to check my work email. (I have to use wifi to do that at the moment)
Plus I got a text message from work complaining that they can't connect in to the vpn because all the sales guys use iphones and the vpn to check their email etc.
O2's data network has been pretty flaky the last few months.
Just got off of the phone with some chap in O2 Business support, apparently this could take up to a week to fix.
Following O2 on twitter it said that there had been a fire in a London sub station.
Checked about getting money back and they said if its a long outage they might refund a portion of the cost.
So that's why I my new mobile broadband gizmo apparently wouldn't install all morning. It's typical, but I always forget- the system is always down when you are trying to install. It gives you lots of practice running through the settings over and over though, trying to figure out which one you mucked up.
Stoke-on-Trent and Barnsley both down, did wonder what was up. though I have to say, didn't exactly spend *long* wondering.
an irritant, but a minor one if its less than a day or so, if it starts to get to about a week I'd expect O2 to make a gesture of some sort, credit for extra SMS or calls maybe, something that won;t cost them much but is at least partly useful.
no SLA on this sort of account, but I'd assume business customers may be checking their contracts a bit more. but a good will gesture would be a reasonable expectation if this occurs too often or goes on too long.
but what would be seriously unexpected: a description of what the problem is, without any BS attached. if someone pulled a plug by accident *say so*, I'm more than happy to deal with a company that has occasional issues but is honest about it, and is willing to fix issues.
The day my iPhone loosing its data connection for a few hours or a couple of days is *critical* to me is the day I need to re-evaluate my life.
we managed without these things before, and until our dear leader mandates everyone must carry a mobile to allow us all to be tracked, i.e. until the day O2's network going down results in *me* being fined I'll cope.
I think, that its actually some evil force of nature that is seriously peeved off at the complete disregard O2 has to its customer loyalty, and i forsee that as each any every one of us comes up to the end of their O2 contract and gets informed that, nope, no more loyalty discount and that free upgrade is now going to cost you £90, they too will join the dark side and leave O2s bubbles...
This post has been deleted by its author
And there was me thinking that the usual outgoing calls failing, incoming calls going straight to voicemail, and "retro" internet speeds (if a connection can be made, it usually reminds me of the early 90s) was business as usual.
Once my 12 months of free web and wifi is up, I'm off.
This afternoon my connectivity stopped working abruptly with the message "unable to activate cellular network" as others have experienced. However one of my mates also with a 3GS on Simplicity was working fine.
As some of you have found out, changing the apn settings to mobile.o2.co.uk does fix the issue. Mine was originally set to wap.o2.co.uk for everything as after lengthy experimentation this is the only apn where the tethering setting won't 'mysteriously vanish', presumably when it does some sort of eligibility check. This was confirmed when I pointed out to my mate that tethering had gone on his even though he had been using it previously.
As its some sort of network glitch ill probably change my settings back to wap.o2.co.uk when its all fixed. In case anyone is unsure about billing.., both wap and mobile appear on my itemized bill as zero charge.
It's responses like these that make me think that a lot of NON TECHNICAL people read the register.
Because most of these responses are so short sighted and narrow minded.
Therse in particular.
1/ Refunds - Get a life, really. People like you suck
2/ Fail - That's so Lame [sic]
3/ Anyone knocking callcentre staff, seriously, you've seen Resevior Dogs, right...You really think they give a shit, paid what they are. MD complaint, now youre talking. Get in there...
4/ Upgrade the network - as was mentioned. There's a recession on, nothing's getting upgraded.
5/ Anyone knocking o2 - No i don't work for them. But Apple chose o2 for the stability of their network. Ask anyone in national networks. Whatever o2's network is, it's stable. V******* T-***** (haha), would have all suffered this yonks ago, multiple times.
I needed a 3G SIM (besides my T-Mob G1 contract) for a project recently, I had the pick of the networks, but no time to do any research. O2 shop lady told me their £7.50 PAYG bolt-on was "unlimited" internet. Turns out she was right, for very small values of "unlimited" - 200Megs a month is pretty weasely for "unlimited" in my book, when the same gets me 15 times more with T-Mob. The internet outage is doing you guys a favour in terms of overage costs, don't moan!
@captain kangaroo
"Anyone knocking o2 - No i don't work for them. But Apple chose o2 for the stability of their network. Ask anyone in national networks. Whatever o2's network is, it's stable. V******* T-***** (haha), would have all suffered this yonks ago, multiple times."
ROFL... Really? Have you never used ANY other UK network? (Hint: there are 5 UK 3G networks and O2 came last for 3G coverage (by a long way) in the recent official Ofcom survey). In addition, my own experience is that they're the only UK network to suffer from "network busy" for voice calls - not seen these on the other networks (7/7 type events being an exception) in 10+ years.
Oh right and:
1.) If I've paid for something I expect it to work. It's people like you that allow the networks to claim limited data plans as unlimited.
2.) They have.
3.) I feel pretty sorry for call centre staff, but they've got no excuse for mistreating the people that pay them (their customers).
4.) Funny, the other networks seem to still be rolling out new coverage and services.
Ironically, O2 is the one reason I would never own an iPhone. I might buy an older 3G version on Orange or Vodafone though.
So what you're suggesting, Mr Kangaroo is that only non-technical people would complain?
Perhaps that's what is wrong with this industry; the techs (and I do count myself as one) accept that products will be dire and that call centre (and probably helpdesk staff) will be unresponsive.
Well frankly, I'm disappointed in you. I demand my own staff and products and service to be impeccable. We meet and exceed our SLAs without fail, we deal with complaints or issues in a collaborative manner, without slighting our company.
As for your statement regarding the failure to upgrade a network in a recession: that's a very short-sighted view for a network that clearly does have a issue.
Anyway, you might want to rethink your view of those who you consider to not be as technical as you. You might also like to take a look at your own industry practices and wonder why everyone in your company hates the IT service that you provide...
Well i'm getting annoyed now. Outages do happen, and if it's a short while, i'm happy for it to just get fixed and nothing more be said. What's getting my goat is the poor communication from o2. Ironic isn't it.
As far as i can deduce there are two issues, which may or may not be related. The substation fire knocked out some cells in London, hence the first recorded announcement I got when I rang them- the problem was limited to London, so... I held as I'm in Lancashire to be told yes there's a problem with data, and no, we don't know when it'll be fixed. So I ring again late last night, and the message is now that they're suffering network congestion- which again doesn't explain my problem of one apn working and another not, no point holding as i don't have 24hr customer service. So more rooting about online to discover that o2 haven't commented since the end of office hours yesterday, now that's not good enough, i'm sure the network faults team work 24 hours, and even that they an eta for a fix now, shame we mere customers can't be told until el reg gets onto the press office again this morning!
BT Engineer's use the BT Mobile MVNO which offers connections on both the Vodafone (primarily) and O2 networks. The O2 is a hangover from BT's past, but a useful one. We as a customer of BT Mobile find this useful as each network has coverage in different areas, the hardest decision is deciding whats best.
Mine stopped working yesterday afternoon, thought nothing of it and left it. Tried again last night and still wasnt working. Tried wi-fi, that wouldnt work either. Did a factory reset on the phone (SE c905) and updated to latest firmware. Requested settings from O2, applied them and still no good.
Tried again this morning at work (other side of Leeds, also different wi-fi network), nothing again on 3G/HSDPA or Wi-Fi, though calls and texts are working. MMS isnt working either obviously. It's showing the HSDPA symbol to show as being connected but mobile internet just errors. Assuming my phone was b0rked, i called O2 and explained my situation
I was told there had been a fire at one of the sites yesterday lunchtime and there was nationwide outage on the GPRS/3G network. According to the woman in the call centre this will also be affecting my ability to connect to my wireless networks at home and work (yeah, right *sigh*) - after questioning why a national mobile network is brought to its knees by an incident at a single site, i was told to call back later as they cant do anything further until the network is restored. fair enough, but it still doesnt explain why my wi-fi is fudged as well, it was working yesterday morning and still is for my laptops etc.
And why does the guy with an iPhone at work still have a working 3G connection? how strange...
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