Three network down: Thousands of UK mobile customers hit by network meltdown

Three UK has said it is aware of a problem with its network
PA
Bonnie Christian17 October 2019

Thousands of Three UK mobile customers have been hit by a network meltdown.

DownDetector, a website which tracks outages, reported nearly 8,000 mobile phone users were without coverage at around 7.30am on Thursday.

By 10am, around 3,000 customers were still without coverage.

The network appears to have been experiencing problems 11pm on Wednesday.

A map showing the areas that have been affected show customers in London, Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, Liverpool and Nottingham were among those hit.

Phone users took to Twitter to say they had been left with no signal and were unable to access the Internet on their phones since midnight.

Some reported they had been without service for up to three hours.

One person wrote: "Three network let me down. I basically work from my phone. So have to drive for an hour back home. Got to be compensated lost of £200 at least."

While another said: "When you relly (sic) on your mobile data for work and it was down for 4 and a half hours😒😒 thanks Three network."

One person said they had a different phone for when outages happen: "Three UK, appears to be down across the whole of the UK. This is why I have a second phone on a different network, but it's still a right royal pain in the bum. Even their websites down".

One person called the situation a "joke": "Yup been down since last night, I need my mobile network as its critical for work, no updates at all from three themselves it's beyond a joke now."

Businesses who used the network were also having to explain why they were having issues with their services on Twitter.

A Newcastle-upon-Tyne art gallery, Laing Art Gallery, said: "Due to the problems with the #Three network, our card machines are having problems working in our shops or for exhibition / admission payments. . We can still accept cash payments. We hope this will be resolved soon. Thank you for your patience."

While, iD Mobile was responding to several angry customers, writing to one: "Three, our network provider, are currently experiencing severe disruption to their service, and this is affecting coverage nationwide. We'll monitor the situation and post updates as soon as we can. Apologies for any inconvenience this may cause."

In a statement, Three UK said: "“Three is currently experiencing technical difficulties with our services across voice, text and data which means that some customers will be experiencing an intermittent service.

"Our engineers are working on the issue now to fix the problem as soon as possible. We are sorry for the inconvenience caused to our customers.”

As well as its mobile network, Three's website was also unavailable on Thursday morning, instead displaying a message which said it was down for "essential maintenance".

The incident came on the day another mobile operator - O2 - became the latest to begin the rollout of its next-generation 5G network.

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