Coverage Checker not accurate, infact a bit of a lie!?

[MartinHrstv]

I've been with EE for about a year now and coverage has been really good for the most part. I've recently changed address and to me having good connectivity really matters. I can never rely on WiFi so I want to have a good mobile coverage in my room.

I've been on EE's coverage checker and there it says that I should have good 5G outdoors and indoors but that's not the case at all. I barely have any 4G to make VoLTE calls which keep dropping when inside the house, let alone use my data for streaming or video calls. I've measured the signal levels I'm receiving in my room and also the whole street and not great at all (-112dBm on the street and -120dBm indoors). Handy code for samsung users (that are not aware) to check their signal reception is *#0011#.

I've called customer service and honestly not much help at all, they just said that the old radios are getting replaced but it will take time. I've also visited my local bruch and they said there's nothing they can do so I'm left helpless and posting here in the hopes that it'll get EE's attention to hopefully resolve this issue.  Can't call a company the best in the UK when their own website is a deceiving and with signal levels like this in urban areas.

Area I live is Reading, not far from Reading West.

[Leanne_T]

Hi @MartinHrstv 

Thanks for coming to the community. 

I am sorry to hear you are having signal problems at your new address. 

Does the Network Status Checker show any reported problems for the area if you select the 'check status' option after entering your postcode and device? 

If not, please select 'report a problem' and complete the details to get this looked into, the network team will update you once the area has been investigated. 

Leanne. 

[bristolian]

The coverage checker is a rough guide to service and is never a guarantee. EE also operate both 4G & 5G services across multiple frequency bands, which makes an accurate prediction on a customer-facing website tool inherently difficult - more so when the vast majority of users have no interest in the various RF measurements which factor into coverage quality. You've mentioned dBM levels, but even this needs a combination of 3 different measurements to be wholly reliable.

CS are in a similar situation, the vast majority of the queries they receive are not from radio engineers but users who just want a working service - so they are geared to that reasoning. With good intentions, they may be alluding to the ongoing Huawei-swap activity.

You've also alluded to indoor coverage - another tricky one, no network will guarantee this and to get 100% national indoor coverage is unlikely to happen with a single operator. It also needs a combination of high-band & low-band deployment, but WiFi-calling is EE's recommended solution for any indoor coverage issues.