Mast Fix Rural Scotland

[Jas771]

Our village is in a very rural area. 
We all have antennas to receive an EE signal from 14 miles away over the sea. It’s always been not too bad at 20 plus mb download (some got 80 occasionally). For at least 2 months the signal is now more or less unusable. I’ve complained to EE but all they say is that they are waiting to fix the mast as they can’t get access. 
Apart from Starlink, this is pretty much our only source of internet. Businesses have been unable to take card payments and many of our older residents can’t pay bills online or even access their bank and calls are pretty much a no go.

the executive office have been really nice and helpful but it doesn’t change the fact that we are pretty much cut off most of the time now.

Theres never any movement on the issue that’s taking weeks, or maybe months at this point.

The advice given is to use call over WiFi (pointless). I’ve been given a months credit on my bill but that doesn’t really make a difference. I’m waiting for the 8 weeks and asking for a deadlock letter and refer to the ombudsman. 
in the meantime has anyone else experienced something similar and do you have any advice?

thanks

[bristolian]

The vast majority of radio site faults are rectified promptly, but sometimes there are circumstances where this is not possible due to a variety of factors. Access issues are one, but there are several potential factors. As frustrating as it is where there is no overlapping coverage, no loss-of-service is left unresolved without valid reason.

Equally whilst you are free to escalate a complaint to the Ombudsman after 8 weeks, I doubt they will be able to add anything more to the case than Exec already have - if (whatever the issue is) the hold-up could be resolved by the relevant support area, it would be.

Whilst WiFi is of no use outdoors, there are scenarios where customers are not aware of the WiFi-calling option and would otherwise be off-service indoors when the facility is there - hence advise to use this is better given than not.

Out of interest, where are you? Feel free to be as vague or precise as you're comfortable, bearing in mind this is a public internet forum.

[Jas771]

Assynt in NW Scotland.

All they know is that they are waiting for access and that’s it. Inconvenient isn’t really the word here as the nearest hospital is 2 and a half hours drive away and there’s one bus a day. So anything done remotely now can’t be.

There was talk of a helicopter at one point and there has been also talk of a local mast being put up by o2/virgin but nothing appears to be happening with that one. 
We have copper wire broadband but my neighbour was registering 0.25mb. 
we don’t qualify for the rural coverage thing as ofcom has us as over 20mb. 
We used to be able to drive up to an hill and sit in the car if we wanted to use it prior to getting the good signal or to another couple of villages but as they get theirs from the same mast it’s pointless now. 

if we hadn’t had it in the past we could have maybe clubbed together and got a more suitable solution but as it stands right now we have practically nothing.

There is full 4g signal at another mast but it’s very minimal speed. 1 or 2mb but it drops out after a few seconds.

I don’t think we would mind as much if we were told the full story about either of these masts and be given a timescale but it does seem like they don’t really care and are probably just keeping costs down.

[bristolian]

I know the area well, EE have invested heavily in NW Scotland as part of S4GI & ESN. Some of that may eventually get backfilled by other operators but there are numerous factors at play.

CS, by and large, are geared towards users who just want a working service and have no interest in any technical details. There is very little they can likely add to your query other than already done so, there certainly isn't any cost-saving at play by ignoring particular outages.

The only occasion when this may come into play is where minor faults may require revisits and these are collated into one round-trip. Losses of service are not generally classed as minor.

[Jas771]

I know EE/BT did a lot of work but got a shed load of cash to provide them but I think a lot of them are capable of 999 calls only. I know and appreciate that there are soo many difficulties up here of providing a service but more information would be useful in this instance. As I say we have a couple of businesses that are unable to really operate without this service. I believe that it is probably a 3rd party contractor that just can’t be bothered.
Someone somewhere must know what’s happening with the EE mast and also the O2 one that'll probably be on the SRN. Although these things are usually discovered via press releases after the fact

[bristolian]

An interesting thread now! I have lots of sympathy with the users there.

There are no sites that are restricted only to 999 calls, all EE's commercial installs under ESN are carrying full service, albeit often only on B20-800Mhz (not the case in Assynt). Some of the EAS sites are reserved for ESN-only users, which may be what you're referring to.

The balance of what info to provide is always a difficult one, and I sympathise with CS who can easily be criticised whatever they do. Fault management is a very complex area, especially where third party dependencies are involved.

[Jas771]

Hi,

I posted previously about problems we were having in our remote village with 4g signal. It has actually gotten worse

To top it all off we’ve been advised that there is an issue with the mast but it won’t be repaired as it will cost too much. We are now struggling to get any internet at all as this is the only mast we can connect to and have been informed if we don’t like it to “go elsewhere”. 
Unfortunately, apart from Starlink, we have no other real options for internet. 
what can we do in this instance. It’s been taken to our local MP/MSP and nothing is happening at all.

[Christopher_G]

Hi @Jas771 

Welcome to the community.

What does it say when you put your postcode into our network status checker?

Chris

[Jas771]

“We know there is a problem”. Which it’s said for months.

[Jas771]

Someone from an executive office I think was looking into it. They had received a report saying they needed to get helicopters to get access to ot, which wasn’t true. Eventually they told someone it needed fixed/replaced but it wouldn’t be done due to cost.