Yesterday my mobile phone had no signal whatsoever, could not make or receive calls. Got in touch with Three and they tell me service is down for 3 or 4 days in my area (Earls Barton near Northampton)
I was absolutely disgusted as they had not even bothered to either write, text or email me.
Anyone had any similar problems with Three?

yup, shite. There’s a reason they’re cheap and no one else is on 3…

Not in the last 8 years no. my missis had had similar issues with voda though

got to say haven’t had a issue with three and my mrs is on orange and pretty much always have more signal than her. and the all you can eat data is pretty good considering i got through 600 mb in 2 days

Not since major prob’s with them about ten years ago, swore never to go with them again! I agree thy are cheap, their service (used to be in any extent) terrible!!

Worst customer service I’ve ever experienced from any company of any description. (including British Gas who pursued me for almost 5 years for an amount that I didn’t actually owe them, which varied between £3k and £10k dependant on who I spoke to and involved them taking me to court where I was able to prove that I did not owe them a single penny. So yes, worse than them is pretty pis-poor tbh)

Vodaphone, O2 and Orange have all had outages here for maintenance or storm damage of a week or so in last year…

No problems whatsoever, and we’ve five mobiles with them.

I find them really good to deal with and, for example, the ability to put a ceiling on bills and they can still call/text other 3 users is brill when you’ve kids.

I have been with them for 6 years now and not had any problems like you OP.

I’m with 3 and live in Northampton. Haven’t had a problem and got fairly decent signal.

The guy in the Wellingborough store told me not to bother with them as the signal coverage at home (Bozeat)is rubbish.

I’m on three and it’s a huge improvement on orange. Words cannot express my hatred for orange mobile.

wrecker – Member
I’m on three and it’s a huge improvement on orange. Words cannot express my hatred for orange mobile.

You do know they are now part of the same company, right?

I’ve been trying out GiffGaff for the last month or so and it seems to have pretty good coverage everywhere I’ve been – and I work all over the UK – cheap as chips too
They use O2 network

as much as I hate 3, how exactly could they text you if their service was down?

Been with them for about six years and I think their the best value for money out there. Service wise no probs and their 3G is very good.

You do know they are now part of the same company, right?

You’d never guess by dealing with them.

Never ever had a problem in many years of being with them. No problems with customer service either.

You do know they are now part of the same company, right?

Really? You’re not confusing them with Everything Everywhere (Orange + T-Mobile) are you?

Personally I’m very happy with Three. I switched to them when the iPhone 4 came out and their Indian call centres had no idea what a micro-SIM was but apart from that everything has been OK. Better data speeds and coverage than anyone else I’ve used and crucially they don’t charge you extra for tethering (aka. personal hotspot). How on earth the other networks can justify charging extra to use your capped data allowance as you see fit I will never understand.

I’m on three and it’s a huge improvement on orange. Words cannot express my hatred for orange mobile.

You do know they are now part of the same company, right?

No they aren’t. 3 UK is 100% owned by Hutchinson Whampoa, a Hong Kong based mega corporation. They also own Superdrug.

Orange and T-Moblie are the ones that are merged under the Everything, Everywhere company. This company is a joint venture between Deutsche Telekom and France Télécom and nothing to do with Hutchinson Whampoa.

Facts is important.

I thought Orange was teamed up with T-Mobile, not Three??

Anyhoo. My other half has had a 3 phone for ages – must be 7 or 8 years at least. Never really had an issue with them and the people in the 3 shop in P’boro are very helpful, not pushy at all and always seem to give out decent advice.
Signal seems just as good as anything else too….

Voda on the other hand. I will never go back to Vodafone.

My wife and I went with 3 as she got an NHS Discount, but would never use them again, fine if you live somewhere near a city or certain rural areas, but coverage i find is very poor.

I cannot use my phone at the in laws in Norfolk, with family in Dorset and Devon, had no reception whilst riding in Exmoor, South and North Wales, Quantocks etc and may of the areas in ride in locally, Swinley, Crowthorne etc it is unusable. I have purchased a Vodafone PAYG phone purely for riding in case I did ever need to call and ambulance etc.

Orange and T-Moblie are the ones that are merged under the Everything, Everywhere company. This company is a joint venture between Deutsche Telekom and France Télécom and nothing to do with Hutchinson Whampoa.

Facts is important.

Remind me again then what + Who MBNL is then??

Fair enough 3 owned by Hutch, but utilising all of EE technology.

Fair enough 3 owned by Hutch, but utilising all of EE technology.

Er no they don’t
They have their own network of sites, I should know I built about 250 of them on the initial 3g roll out!

Fair enough 3 owned by Hutch, but utilising all of EE technology.

Er no they don’t
They have their own network of sites,

Correct, but they are also using all of EE sites aswell as their own.. oh, and de-comming loads of their own sites when they can go onto an EE Site..

Hence the MBNL project.- Providing 3 Customers with a 2g Network..

I should know I built about 250 of them on the initial 3g roll out!

Congratulations… 🙄

So to summarise this thread;

Three, (as well as other providers) are (sometimes, but not always) the pits…

FWIW, I’ve had no problem with them, and often have signal when friends on other networks don’t. YMMV.

I’d been with 02 for years and decided to give three a try because loads of people were raving about data speeds on smartphones using three and 02 is seriously bad.. Did a 1 month rolling tarriff to make sure coverage was okay and cancelled the O2 contract after 2 days. I’ll never move from 3 – I pay £15 a month, have all I can eat data and coverage is almost always good enough to watch tv on my iPhone. Tethering also works a treat and I often get 9mb in my house with 2mb upload which is 3 times faster than my broadband.

I’m very pleased the f1 channel is on sky go as I can watch the f1 wherever I am now:)

I’m on three and it’s a huge improvement on orange.

Yep as a above £ is owned by Hutchinson and Orange used to be – I switched from orange to 3 at the same time —

no issues apart from a dodgy HTC firmware update that killed the phone – 3 just gave me a new one.

Not had any trouble with the mobile side of things, but the broadband was hideously bad, then they kept charging me long after I’d cancelled my contract in writing (post-expiry). In the end i had to cancel my direct debit and it took me 4 months to get my money back.