Vodafone 4G dropping connection overnight

[kbrownuk]

Hi 

I am based in Devon and use 4G for working from home as the BT Connection is so poor in my area. It has been working fine for many months and had fantastic download speeds in excess of 70mbps at most times however I am  finding that the connection drops overnight after midnight and needs to be rebooted in the morning (sometimes more than once ) to get restored. I am using an external antenna and have been in contact with the manufacturers to look into the issue but they are saying the problem is with the vodafone network.

If the router is not rebooted in the morning it does sometimes return on its own without any intervention.

Vodafone network status is not showing any issues but I am convinced this is some sort of bandwidth management or energy saving attempt on the mast outside of peak times. 

I use multiple sites and have seen this at most locations.

Is anyone else seeing this problem recently from about november 22 onwards?

[Effie]

You're welcome @Symbister and your feedback is appreciated. 

[KateBart1]

Hi, yes ours drops at midnight too, very frustrating- signal not great at the best of times. We are in Somerset 

[ARH1950]

I raised this problem with Vodafone several months ago, I think before November.  No explanation was forthcoming.  I'm using a Huawei router which is fed by an aerial in the loft.  The mast concerned is at Scalloway in Shetland.  When this happens, the router is still indicating that a 4G signal is being received (pale blue light, three bars out of three), but there is no internet connection.  It doesn't happen every night, but when it does, it's invariably at or just after midnight.  If I wake up in the night, as I usually do, the internet signal has usually been restored if I try connecting at, say 2am, and it's always back by 4am.  It comes back without any action by me - no rebooting.  It's very strange, and someone at Vodafone must know the answer to this.

[Janey]

Hi @KateBart1 and @ARH1950 Thanks for posting, we'd love to help your mobile broadband connections! Firstly, I'd recommend following the steps here for slow or no data connection. If you're then still having issues, or need further help, please pop our team a message on our socials here and we'll take a closer look. Just let them know you've posted on our Community Forum too.

[ARH1950]

Thanks JaneyR, but I've been down this route before and the issue continues to arise.  It doesn't happen every night, and indeed sometimes it doesn't happen for several days.  It didn't happen last night.  The question is whether it is technically possible for the 4G signal to be maintained, but with internet connectivity lost.  That appears to be what is happening and the post-midnight internet dropout seems (as others have said) to be pretty much independent of device or location.  I'm actually going to be away from base for a while, so won't be able to check the situation in the next few weeks.  However, one of your technical people should be able to advise you whether this is possible and (if so) why it's happening, for example maintenance..

And that brings me to a point I've made before.  I do appreciate that you're following Vodafone's procedure, but I think that customer service works best when the first point of contact has the authority and autonomy to find the answer to a problem, rather than having to direct the customer to another point of contact.  I think that whoever is in charge of designing your customer service arrangements needs to have a re-think.

Over and out, for the moment, I'm afraid, as I'm getting organised for travel.  Thank you again for your comments.     

[Janey]

Thanks for getting back to me @ARH1950 I appreciate your response. If a 4G connection is present, you should have internet connectivity. Our team is trained to troubleshoot and investigate network issues so whenever you're ready, please do feel free to drop us message. Enjoy your travels and if you need further help, you know where we are. 

[ARH1950]

Thank you.  Much appreciated.

[Amivictoria]

How funny this has been happening to me since day one of joining their network, as you have said I’ve tried every test every diagnostic it’s not my router or devices it’s Vida phone they cut off bang on 12:01 every night night, I have to reset everything and eventually around 2am it’ll come back on… when I work at night it’s useless, I pay £40 a month to access unlimited data as I live rural too and have no option for WiFi the service never works and I feel your pain when I raise It im told no it was on there was no disruption 😂 so we are ALl Wrong? All experiencing the same thing? This is madness. We get no compensation no real reason as to why this happens daily no proper explanation maybe they can try and run one of their web chat centres from my living room and they’d soon notice the outage day in day out 

[Kate31cook]

Hi - I am based in Somerset near the Devon boarder and I am getting this exact problem. I am using a huwaei 4G router and it works fine during the day then after midnight it drops off completely with no 4G at all. It works fine in the morning when I am up so it seems be dropping from midnight to the early hours.  I actually have an EE mobile and that retains 5G signal fine so I think it can’t be the mast. It’s odd that many people are getting this exact same problem.  Anyway - did you manage to solve this problem? Thanks 

[Mimi12345]

Hi, I am Ami Victoria I couldn’t reply to my response however will tell you that I was shot down and called a liar by people on this site that don’t even work for vodaphone for expressing this issues and saying it isn’t just me to then be told to contact someone who worked in vodaphone, I called vodaphone directly  and was told there isnt and hasn’t been anything wrong with their connection in my area and to call them when it happens,  so I waited until the usual midnight (as I was working) and low and behold no one to talk to me about it, just being fobbed off good luck