Tens of thousands of Vodafone customers in the UK reported problems accessing internet and mobile phone services on Monday afternoon. The outage, which began around 3pm, saw more than 135,000 reports on monitoring site Downdetector by 3.20pm.
Over two-thirds of the incidents related to home broadband services, while almost a quarter involved mobile internet access. Approximately 8% of customers reported being unable to make calls due to no mobile signal. Some users also found they could not access the Vodafone app or website.
The disruption affected cities including London, Birmingham, Cardiff, Glasgow and Manchester. Vodafone confirmed the issue was confined to its UK network and was not a cyber-attack. The company stated that 2G voice calls and SMS messaging were unaffected.
In a statement, a VodafoneThree spokesperson apologised and said the network was recovering. At 6pm, Downdetector still showed about 4,000 problem reports. Vodafone has 18 million UK customers and over 700,000 broadband users, having recently merged with Three UK, whose customers were not affected.
Other major networks, including BT, EE and VirginMediaO2, reported no issues. Sabrina Hoque of Uswitch.com reminded customers that under Ofcom regulations, compensation of £9.76 per day may be available for broadband outages lasting more than two days. For mobile signal issues, compensation depends on circumstances, but users may get a refund or credit.
