Mobile Carriers

This isn’t something I’ve ever noticed when I’ve used EE (not for a few years, now). I guess it depends on the exact location. I have an EE/Three mast a few hundred metres from home.

I’d imagine you get broadly similar coverage from these two as they seem to share a lot of masts.

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This sort of debate shows how it’s always best to test a variety of networks with free PAYG sims yourself before committing to a provider. EE objectively claim to have “the best” coverage of any network, but this doesn’t mean everywhere and it’s possible that an individual could find important locations are no good.

As we live in a house with thick stone walls, we absolutely require Wifi calling support (including for texts which not all networks offer) to be able to use our phones at home. Many of the MVNOs are therefore out immediately as they don’t support Wifi calling. Other people may not face this issue and be able to pick from a completely different range of providers. This just goes to show how individual people’s needs can be.

Also, a note on Three 5G broadband: I regularly read ispreview.co.uk and people there have commented that Three are very conservative with their mobile broadband 5G coverage so if you can order it anyway (or order your own 5G SIM and basestation for your own setup) you probably can receive it.

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I should elaborate that any of the main networks seem to have pretty good coverage in my current town (Cheltenham). Probably a mixture of the sheer amount of business here paired with the racecourse.

But I guess, that only holds true for outdoor. Indoor, I require WiFi Calling. Of which Virgin Mobile doesn’t seem to be working for me, same with their VOLTE

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They cost too much and offer very little… £25 for a fake “unlimited”. In italy, there are much cheaper offers with more gigs and are also in 5G :slight_smile:

For example:

I spend €10 and I have

  • Unlimited minutes to national fixed and mobile numbers
  • Unlimited national SMS
  • Unlimited Giga in Italy at full 5G speed
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Now see, this is quite the issue, I’m not in Italy

I somewhat care about company ethics and I have never in my life used 650gb in a month of mobile data. I would probably get the 13.50 plan for 4GB lol

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What’s noteworthy about Sky mobile features?

The data roll-back capability is handy where unused data is stored in a bank (for up to three years) and can be drawn down from as necessary. This facility is valid for up to 7 sims on one account.

It means I can have a small data package per phone (in my case 2GB for £6) and, as most data is Wi-Fi, I always have spare.

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The piggybank for me. And they support most of the useful iPhone carrier specific features without weird artificial limitations.

They recently started charging for EU roaming, but providing you pay for the pass, there’s no limits on how you can roam either. Other carriers tend to hide some kind of FUP that restricts your data speed and how much data you can use before they start charging extra.

Their approach to contracts is very appealing, and far more affordable, and you don’t have to wait for your contract to end to swap to a new phone. You don’t even need a sim plan from them either, and as such you can change your plan on the fly whenever you like. They have a lot of good deals that you can lock into permanently when they pop up too.

I’m currently paying £9 per month for 20GB 5G. what I don’t use goes into my piggy bank, and prior to the Ukraine appeal where you could exchange 25GB of your piggybank for a £10 donation, I had over 300GB sitting in my piggybank, which was mine to use however, whenever, and wherever I like. There’s no artificial caps or speed limits on the 5G or 4G. No limits on how many devices you can tether. They support wifi calling and texts. Voice over LTE, visual voicemail. Not as feature complete as EE (They’re missing wifi calls and texts via iCloud connected devices, which is not an issue if your phone has data, and eSim support) but they have the important stuff.

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Keep an eye out round December/January. You can often lock in more data at the same price, if not cheaper. I have a few sims on my account that are 3GB for £6. During the holiday they tend to launch a plan that’s 1GB higher for the same price, or they keep the data the same but deduct it for £1. You have to keep an eye out though and swap to the new one when that happens. But you’re locked into it until you switch to something else.

I currently get an extra 10% loyalty discount for my sims, so I’m actually paying £5.40 at the moment. It seems to be a rolling haggling offer. Started when I was being charged for 5G despite signing up for Sky VIP. When they eventually fixed it they gave me a 12 month 10% discount on all my sims and told me to get back in touch when it ends and they’ll reapply it. So that’s what I’ve been doing ever since.

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Can you buy passes for roaming outside EU or is that only charged on PAYG basis?

Depends on the destination of course, but you didn’t used to need the pass for roaming in the EU. It was free and just used your plan normally.

The roaming passport previously was £5 per day and it let’s you use your plan as normal. It covered 10 popular non-EU destinations such as the USA. When EU roaming was moved behind the roaming passport, it was lowered to £2 per day, but everything else remains the same, so it’s great for those who travel to those places that previously cost £5. It was never exhaustive though. There are countries not included, and for those you’ll be charged on a PAYG basis and they’re not cheap.

You can have a look on a country by country basis here:

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Currently on voxi swapped form Vodafone monthly

Thanks @N26throwaway, that’s good to know. As a VIP of 22 years, I might have some clout if I wade in (mentioning you while I’m at it :sweat_smile:).

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Three used to be very bad for this.

While their Feel at Home inclusive roaming was, at one point, excellent there were always fairly restrictive data caps whilst roaming even if you paid for an unlimited SIM. They also used to limit their customers to 3G only when roaming (back when 4G was new) probably in a further attempt to stop them using much data by forcing them onto slow speeds. In some cases this made the connection borderline unusable.

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It was particularly galling being on Three, and being restricted to 3G when roaming, as the only time I could enjoy good coverage on Three was when I was abroad!

I have to say that coverage seems to have improved over time, though.

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Yes, coverage is very good in the U.K. on Three now - but they still won’t support eSIM or Visual Voicemail on iPhones!

eSIM is supposedly coming soon, but there is no sign of Visual Voicemail ever arriving.

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No eSIM slightly annoying, but I guess importing phones from HK is always an option /s

eSIM has been coming soon for several years. It even got as far as being possible if you visited certain Three stores in December 2020 (which is kind of against the point of eSIM, but ho hum).

Still no dice. I will believe it when I see it.

Three coverage is excellent. Bandwidth and overall quality of service - very very patchy, and not just data either, I’ve experienced voice drop outs despite strong signal and all sorts where I live (a suburb of Nottingham). On the flipside, when I’ve stayed in rural wales, despite a weaker signal I’ve had perfectly acceptable service.

I was motivated to go with Three because they were the only provider offering 5G in my area but in reality the service was inferior to Vodafone’s 4G service. I think in truth their network is oversubscribed in some areas leading to network congestion. The same is true of the Virgin Media broadband network, if you’re lucky to live in an area with plenty of capacity the service is great. If you live in an area like mine, despite whatever the speed test shows, the service is simply too congested to work consistently.

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It all depends where you are…

Three’s coverage where I am is the worst by a long way, and it seemed to get worse, so I had to port out my Honest Mobile Number to EE as they offered me a deal…

Honest Mobiles Customer Services is awesome, and during the week very quick to respond in app.

My advice to anyone look at a new provider get a PAYG sim and test coverage that way…

It does all depend where you are but my point is that signal strength alone is not a strong enough measure of how usable the service actually is.

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