Vodafone.

[Christmas themed thank]

No complaints for me with Voda, been an early 4G adopter and it's been pretty damn good. It's always fine with H/H+ too so maybe I'm just lucky with the 3G signal?

Have fun trying to stream Netflix over Vodafone 3G.

 

[Derp]

OK here's the really bad guide to how cell incidents work. This is for all networks, they all have the same drama to follow because they pretty much all share sites. 4G on Voda is shared with O2 for sites, EE have a bulk deal with three through a 3rd party company they formed together and outsourced the support to.

1) Site incident happens, alarms go off in the control centre, incident opened.
2) Try to fix incident by remote, try to turn it off and on again in your best roy impression
3) When that fails, try to contact Landlord and get permission (Written ) to go on site to fix it.
4) BIG OL PROBLEM BIT - Landlords may suddenly decide to be complete pain, try to ask for money, ask for stuff not in their agreement, not allow access, "lose" the keys, you name it, they can just be a huge time waste in the process. The ones that take months to fix are these, there is no reason a network wants it's mast down, they are assets that need to be used. I assure you, mast down is a lose lose for everyone.
5) Get on site, diagnose issue.
6) Are replacement parts needed? Usually a same day thing (otherwise it's back to written permission for another day!) otherwise try to fix etc...
7) quick few tests
8) join site back to network

You can check which mast you're on with a few apps (You're after the cell ID number) if you want to track yourself. You'll probably go through quite a few masts over a 4 mile journey.

Richy, I assume you're going to offers.vodafone.co.uk? I set up both netflix and spotify in the last month through it, I already had accounts with both services and just tagged them up OK. Support can manually add them if you can't get it working but I realise that's not great news.
If you're doing netflix make sure you do the free trial first and then sign up, I think netflix is only 6 months rather than a full year like spotify (make sure you check) so you want to squeeze in that free month and get 7 free if you havn't already done it too

That is very accurate... you're not based in Newbury or Bracknell, by any chance are you?

 

[CaNsA]

Just because.

10miles from Liverpool city centre.

 

[Christmas themed thank]

Dat upload.

 

[Myshra]

I am in the non-HQ part of Newbs Derp, although bracknell is a second home to group these days. The list was written from my Orange days when I worked more for the UK domestic market, landlords never change.

Realistically, no network is perfect and everyone's experience will be different. Some guy just got 120MBps in London in another thread, contrast that to the above (although upload is seldom used, 200Kbps is a bit crap ) Whatever is said will never appease people (especially if they made the decision about the network they are on). All networks are in the business of keeping custom and the best decider of that is signal these days.

Turns out it's the mast on my doorstep that is the problem. If so they have good access to it as it's tagged onto a local radio mast next to the road.

Going on signal strength I always thought I'd be connected to that as it's dominates the skyline up on higher ground about 2km to the east. We live on a hill too so reception isn't a problem. Anyway, Network Signal Pro app has always said I was connected to masts elsewhere up to 12 miles away. Always ignored the mast on our doorstep. Basically I'm thinking the app is useless?

It's possibly not useless, networks load balance and you might be on that mast (although 12 Miles is a huge distance these days, cell density is much higher these days). I hope access is good and shared masts are a good sign (networks all chat with each other about sites, share land etc... it's good for everyone's business). You phoned up and asked what's going on / asking for some compensation? I've been comped a month before when the mast 100m from me died for a week. No guarantee but eh, works some times.

 

[Caged]

I've had nothing but issues using Vodafone in central London. Dropped calls, non-existent data throughput etc.

 

[Tummy]

In the ten plus years I have been with Vodafone, I can honestly say I have had very few issues. Good signal and 4G coverage for me.

My current contract (on my iPhone 6+, I buy each iPhone when they are released and I am on a SIM only deal) is £26.50 a month: unlimited texts, unlimited minutes, 4GB of 4G data and 100 MMS messages per month. That includes a student discount too.

 

[Richy888]

It's possibly not useless, networks load balance and you might be on that mast (although 12 Miles is a huge distance these days, cell density is much higher these days). I hope access is good and shared masts are a good sign (networks all chat with each other about sites, share land etc... it's good for everyone's business). You phoned up and asked what's going on / asking for some compensation? I've been comped a month before when the mast 100m from me died for a week. No guarantee but eh, works some times.

Cells aren't all that dense here but I'm out in the countryside. I am on a hill and have good line of sight for about 40 miles from SW to NW so imagine there will be a few that would be available ... subject to range.

I contacted Vodafone support via their user forum. Not had the best of success calling a call center not to mention the rigmarole you go through to get to the right department and identifying yourself. They offered some compensation once issue was sorted of which I'm not bothered about the few quid they may or maynot give. More interested in getting the service restored. But a free month I'll not turn down

Being in the countryside I'm used to variable service. Been on Three for a few years and apart from the recent rash of call dropping, I may have stayed with them. I tested Voda on payg before Christmas and found them excellent. Good call quality and fast 4g data. 32down 18up and 40ms ping which I'll take all day any day Not that I really need such speeds on a phone but pretty much zero lag and instant loading of for example, web pages is great.

 

[Richy888]

Richy, I assume you're going to offers.vodafone.co.uk? I set up both netflix and spotify in the last month through it, I already had accounts with both services and just tagged them up OK. Support can manually add them if you can't get it working but I realise that's not great news.
If you're doing netflix make sure you do the free trial first and then sign up, I think netflix is only 6 months rather than a full year like spotify (make sure you check) so you want to squeeze in that free month and get 7 free if you haven't already done it too

Myshra. Finally found an answer to the the prob I had claiming my netflix subscription. Had a read through the support forums at Vodafone and a few having the same issue. One fella had contacted support by live chat and they said the offer was ending soon and there wasn't anything they could do. Then suggested cancelling their current netflix account and making a new one. Needless to say Netflix said that was a bad idea.

A poster on the same thread had spotted the answer. You went through the process of activating your netflix gift and end up at Netflix page told you to either create an account or log in. You log into your account then look in the address bar where you see 'code=xxxxxxxxxxxx' in the address for the page. Select the code then paste into box where you enter a code to claim a gift and you're away

Still got no service but assured it's being worked on. Went to log into my account this morning at Vodafone and get " Please contact Customer Services on 0845 440 2074." as they've had a problem setting my account up?

Have I been unlucky or are they really so incompetent?

 

[Myshra]

Self serve takes about 14 days to activate on new accounts iirc, I found this out when I had to disable the adult filter to come to these forums a few years ago wish I knew more about the UK market to help sorry, 191 is really the only number you should need for support too.

It's honestly disappointing to see you have had such a bad time (and when others report issues). While it's a bit faceless for me to say it, everyone I work with there is hugely committed to customers and making sure people can keep in touch is what drives me every day (well that and m2m, this tech is absolutely incredible). I am glad you sorted netflix. didn't know it was finishing soon, guess it's back to spotify soon then for most. It's hard to know how often an experience this is received but even the fact that it happened once is too much. If you do decide to stay drop me a message in trust.

 

[Richy888]

Myshra. Well, I'm still with Vodafone. After over a week of no signal they seemed to have fixed it here. We had it on and off for a few days. It would be restored in the afternoon only for it to go off during the night (unless they were working during the night?) Was about 2 days before my 14 day cooling off period was up before it settled down. I'm only on a 12month sim only deal.

Anyway, now network is back up round here I'm finding Vodafone very good. I'm in rural N Yorkshire and getting a good solid 4G signal. Even in house and stone buildings there is still a great signal unlike Three and EE. EE and Three don't have 4G in my locale though Three's 3G or DC-HSDPA was always fairly good though no where near Vodafones 4g speeds. If not for the call dropping I may well be still with Three. Anyway guess the building penetration is down to their 800mhz frequency? Speedtest yields 39/22 Mbps and 50ms pings. Those speeds of course vary a little but more than enough for a smart phone Good call quality too and to date no dropped calls.

Managed to activate both Netflix and Spotify Premium 'free' with my contract.

Had to contact support as there was a problem with 'My Account' but at least they sorted it. Got to laugh as when I tried to log into my account I was told there was a problem and to call a number. Called the number and then got a message to say the number had changed and the call would be connected using the new number. Got to speak to someone and she said I'd contacted the wrong department. Explained about the number change and she knew nothing about it and was strange the website should use an old one. Very helpful anyway and forwarded me to correct department where operative sorted my problem. Seems confusion reigns with Vodafone.

I'm fairly confident all is sorted now. I've got 3months to use their 4G as much as I like on their data test drive. After that I'm on 6gigs a month which should be ample for me. If not I guess I'm allowed to upgrade my contract? Not that I should need too. 4G is that good I keep forgetting to enable wifi when I'm at home

 

[e36Adz]

Does anyone know who I can contact at Vodafone regarding an online web order? The online web order team are a utter disgrace, every single person I've spoken to from that department lies through their teeth. I'd had enough of it by last Friday so cancelled my order, which they said they've done and... 'DPD will be along today to collect the handset and your refund with you by Wed at the latest'. A week later and no DPD, no refund, nothing. They don't return calls, they put you on hold for hours hoping you give up and hang up the call which in the end I'm forced to do.

 

[[HB]Rugrat]

Does anyone know who I can contact at Vodafone regarding an online web order? The online web order team are a utter disgrace, every single person I've spoken to from that department lies through their teeth. I'd had enough of it by last Friday so cancelled my order, which they said they've done and... 'DPD will be along today to collect the handset and your refund with you by Wed at the latest'. A week later and no DPD, no refund, nothing. They don't return calls, they put you on hold for hours hoping you give up and hang up the call which in the end I'm forced to do.

They do indeed lie through their teeth and they're not the only team that does - I rang to end my contract the other week and was talked into staying with a very good deal on a samsung galaxy note 4... the only snag being they're now charging me standard high-street prices and there's no record of any discounts being agreed (the cheeky so and so's even said "oh don't worry about the text you get from us confirming at a higher price, the discount will be applied later").

They're "investigating" by retrieving the recording of the phonecall - a quick look at their support forum shows that a worrying number of these recordings mysteriously vanish however.

Bunch of cowboys - as long as you're getting a good service, great but if you ask them to do anything or they offer you something - get it in writing up front!

 

[e36Adz]

I rang them again today, I asked to speak to 'Emanuel' - a manager apparently who put me on hold for an hour last time and never came back to the phone. It's a small team because the person I spoke to knew him, surprise surprise he was once again in a meeting and couldn't come to the phone. I waited and I got him on the phone eventually and demanded an email confirming my order was cancelled last week, the cheeky ****** had the nerve to say sure I'll do that now, one second, HOLD.... and there I was stuck on hold again, he never came back to the phone. I've put an official complaint through in writing today to this address (http://www.vodafone.co.uk/about-us/code-of-practice/) but I don't expect anything to come from it. The team I keep speaking to is based in India. Pauline, Emanuel aren't their real names. I can't even cancel my order and return the handset, because they don't actually do anything but lie on the phone. What on earth am I suppose to do?

 

[[HB]Rugrat]

At that point - ombudsman. You've tried to use the company's own procedure to resolve it but been frustrated.

http://consumers.ofcom.org.uk/complain/phone-and-broadband-complaints/

 

[chanjy]

Very strange my return was processed by a UK based call centre with no fuss at all. They sent me a pre paid RMSD postage bag,I popped the phone in and went down to the post office and they gave me a receipt to prove I'd sent it

 

[e36Adz]

Very strange my return was processed by a UK based call centre with no fuss at all. They sent me a pre paid RMSD postage bag,I popped the phone in and went down to the post office and they gave me a receipt to prove I'd sent it

Was yours an online web order? Whenever I've contacted vodafone, they don't have any details of mine because I'm not a vodafone contract holder, nor even a payg customer because I don't have a vodafone SIM, so I end up being transferred everytime to the 'online web order team' which are based in India and are unbelievably shocking. I've never had an issue with companies moving their call centres abroad, they normally do the best they can to sort any issues out but this is something else entirely. They deliberately just mock you on the phone, saying 'okay... okay.... okay....okay' and then beep, you're on hold. They don't care, and these are supposedly managers unless they are just passing me around to each other pretending? I really hope the calls are recorded because then it'll be my word against theirs and there is more than one of them. The 3 names are Pauline, Emanuel and Mahendra. When I rang yesterday I was speaking to someone else, I didn't bother to take his name but he knew all 3 of the above, so it's a relatively small team.

Luckily I ordered via CC so I've started a dispute but my CC company have sent me some forms asking whether I have anything in writing from vodafone confirming the order was cancelled - I don't since they won't email me. And also if I've returned the goods, I haven't since they won't actually cancel the order and have it collected despite saying they have.

 

[chanjy]

Yeah, PAYG web order. I started a live chat and said I wanted to return the phone, they called me back and set it up inside 5 mins. Weird how they have two different procedures

 

[e36Adz]

Yeah, PAYG web order. I started a live chat and said I wanted to return the phone, they called me back and set it up inside 5 mins. Weird how they have two different procedures

Similar to what happened with me, live chat, call back and then put through to the department - except nothing seems to have been cancelled here. Phone is still sat on my desk, no sign of DPD and now, every time I get through to that dept, they are not interested and they will not confirm via email the order was ever cancelled.

I got confirmation yesterday via the online chat that it should have been collected from me and that I'm still waiting for the handset to be collected, she wouldn't actually go so far as saying 'yes your order was cancelled', despite me asking several times, but the above is good enough for me. If they are sending someone, or supposed to be sending someone to collect it, I had to have cancelled the order at some point.

 

[Myshra]

Well this is really going downhill fast e36Adz For what it's worth you should record all calls with CS teams now, ACR on android or similar. I would E-mail the exec team (mail the CEO) for the quickest response. If you're after 14 days things are going to get hairy, you'll need to quote the day time etc.. you cancelled. This can be matched to a time/date your account details were looked at, boom you're done. Stop using the web team if they won't reply in black or white, get a call back.

Its likely a different procedure because ones a contract return, the other payg. Without knowing the dates involved, there may be contractual problems.