At last we know for sure. Blighty's 'best mobile network' is ... The biannual survey of mobile networks conducted by RootMetrics has found that EE still leads the pack, and provides the best mobile phone coverage. RootMetrics' report said that “EE earned a clean sweep of all six UK RootScore awards including Overall Performance, Network Reliability, Network Speed, Mobile Internet, Call, and …
Ah, billing performance. Well EE are tops here. Not that we've used 3. But Vodafone managed to overcharge us one month by £2,500 (on a £230 contract). Basically they forgot we had a data allowance, and so charged us pay-as-you-go rates.
Whereas O2 forgot to bill us for 4 months, despite the fact that I'd had to call them after setting up the service as they'd taken one direct debit, then stopped. Then they double billed us the next month, as they put our service back on the billing system, then re-created the account again from scratch...
O2's call centre lose on grounds of utter cluelessness though - and one department not being able to talk to another.
Well anecdotally, I would have to disagree, my brother went for a phone on EE and ended up giving it back, as he never got any useable signal at all round where we live, never mind 4G. Of the others, O2 is the most consistently available network in this area, but even that has dead spots, with Vodafone a close second.
Giffgaff is pretty good for data and signal round me. The call quality is never the best but adequate.
On the other hand Giffgaff is pretty useless at the in-laws. The signal is great and shows no sign of weakness, calls are fine too, but the '3G' connection seems unable to process data at more than GPRS speeds.
Probably gonna have to switch from O2 to EE myself, all the networks claim to have really good signal in my area but O2's signal tends to be around 2 bars when in the house.
Normally not a issue (texts get through etc) but whenever I actually use the phone to phone someone , a shocking thing to do with a phone I know, I can hear them but they can't hear me properly, every single time. Its happened with multiple phones now as well to varying degrees.
O2 just say "well the signals apparently good in your area" yeah I know what your map says but its not true :P
Housemate had similar issues with Three so maybe just our street is a generic mobile phone blackspot.
While they have their failings, I'll give Three their due. It took all of about 30 minutes to agree that the signal indoors was non-existent - it didn't even have enough ummph to qualify as pants. Once that was agreed, it was a quick hop and a skip to securing their Home signal which backhauls over the broadband - and as the rest of the family are on Three as well, they can all be registered on the same device. Result - 4 bars indoors.
Changed SIM recently - and when that didn't sign on, a quick call to Three support and 5 minutes later it was sorted - the registration on the Home signal is via the SIM ID.
All in all - it makes them usable.
Same here. I've received consistently good support from O2 via their online chat feature over the 12 months I've been with them. Occasionally you can find yourself completely reliant on after-sales support, and they didn't let me down when it mattered (phone nicked whilst on holiday in Spain).
Cheshire's no better for O2, in my experience.
I'm spending a lot of time travelling from Brum to Chester in the last few months.
Having been an Orange customer for many years, I abandoned EE at home in Brum after their 3G service collapsed shortly after their 4G went live. I picked O2 because it worked at home. Turns out O2 doesn't work where I am 'away'.
So I now have a dualSIM phone with O2 and EE networks available. Neither works well in the M6/M56 area. Some areas have not even got GSM coverage, and the idea of using internet radio along the way is laughable,
Aren't market forces wonderful.
I'd go with Three as their pricing for data is miles better than everyone else (though getting more expensive for unlimited now), but coverage is key for me especially in the more rural spots and in buildings and EE still rule there for where I use it. Plus 4G is rather nippy.
Customer service is rubbish of course but they all are.
Other attraction of Three however is they believe in Gaining Provider Led switching, i.e. where you sign up with a new provider and they do all the switching work for you without you spending hours or days battling with the existing provider's retention department just to get a PAC and then all the faff involved in the meantime switching, assuming you haven't been conned into taking a new phone contract just to keep you on their expensive tariff and as a customer.
Three were even promoting contacting your MP about it. I did and I got an obviously prepared copy'n'paste answer effectively saying the Tories have an interest in keeping it Lost Provider Led in the UK. I would assume because they have interests or investments in some of the major operators in the UK. All wrapped up in some fluff about how the UK is a unique market, blah blah, and they don't believe it's good for the UK to change it.
Bollox. And Ofcom agree with me... http://hexus.net/mobile/news/service-providers/85013-mobile-network-switching-easier-proposes-ofcom/
With my phone on EE I often have no signal. When I have a data connection it has a selection of letters: 'H', 'H+', 'G', 'E' and maybe a few others? Anyway experience has shown that all of these letters signify that I have download rate a little slower than a 22.5k dial-up modem.
My employer has its contract for mobile phones with BT. When BT decided to buy EE we were forced to move from the Vodafone network to EE. Within two weeks 90% of our staff had ordered femtocells for their homes because the reception was so bad they couldn't make or receive calls. My company and its staff are located in the remote wilderness of central Sussex.
my Three phone easily beat the 2Mbps of the ADSL. SWIMBO's on EE, and if she wants data in this part of Warwickshire, most of the time it has to be done by my phone's hotspot. Text and Voice no problem; but data's an absolute joke - I'd have to keep reminding myself its 100x better than Voda or I'd burst into tears.
1 dropped call in 50 is acceptable? Hmm...
Given that mobile voice and data are so heavily relied on by the public and business these days, Isn't it about time that government and OFCOM got some teeth and forced a mandate for all mobile operators to meet specific and publicly visible standards for signal coverage for voice and data, voice call quality, minimum acceptable data speeds (per G type), number of dropped calls, and maximum acceptable outages? (amongst others). Especially for out-of-city locations.
I don't have any problems with dropped calls. No signal.
Moved from Vodafone as they had no signal and as did Vodafone before, they lied about having signal.
Why does Trading Standards not stop this. It is worse than up to 8Mb/s claims for 0.25Mb/s which I had for a while.
So BT (EE) gives me no signal 6 miles south of Norwich with a combined adjacent 3 village population of 4000+.
Heaven help anyone in South Norfolk that brakes down or needs urgent assistance. Coverage is area NOT population.
Why do all these comparisons always talk about 4G when something like 20% of the UK still doesn't even get call and text coverage, it's ridiculous. The closest i've come to an answer is a multi network sim that basically hops from one network to the next grabbing the strongest signal from whichever network happens to have the best coverage in that particular area, but it can be reasonably pricey, https://pebblenetwork.ltd.uk is one such best mobile coverage provider network and for 500 mins or texts it's £24.99 per month on a sim only basis. It's better than being stuck without signal entirely, obviously and I can see how it would be great in rural areas etc but with data being expensive from these types of providers you'll probably want to use a dual sim arrangement where you can use a cheaper sim for data when you're in area with a signal decent enough to get mobile data. I don't believe EE's 95% landmass coverage by 2020 for one minute personally, they keep pushing the deadline back, same as the rest of them, always moving the goalposts.
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