Roaming in Sydney Australia - no 4G or 5G

[Andy_7]

Hi all. Desperately hoping for some help.   I recently took out a Vodafone contract that included roaming coverage of Australia.  I’ve now arrived in central Sydney and I can’t get anything other than 3G, which is really slow.  In Australia you need data even for ordering food from a table (scan QR codes) and I’m really struggling.

I’ve spent over an hour on the phone (of my holiday) to Vodafone uk and after trying many things, they couldn’t help.  I’ve then spent all night on twitter speaking to another Vodafone Rep, whole asked me to try many things and has now given up.  Stating (unbelievably) that Vodafone can’t guarantee 4G/5G in Sydney and there’s nothing more they can do!  I’m just stunned.

My other half is also on a similar Vodafone tariff and she has the same issue.  3G only !

Has anyone else had this issue / managed to get it resolved ?  I’m really upset over this and paying for a contract that has been potentially mis-sold.  Btw, I have an iPhone 13 Pro Max if this is any help.

[Andy_7]

Update.  I spent another 1hr 20 min + on webchat yesterday evening to a lovely rep.  They did the same things all over again.  Couldn’t resolve.  I now have a ticket number and in theory it’s been forwarded to “backend support”, but almost 24 hours later no one has contacted me and I’m still stuck on 3G.

[chistery]

Vodafone don't guarantee 4g/5G in the UK, so not sure how they can do it for a roaming partner where they can't control it, so not sure you've been mis-sold

If data is important whilst on holiday, you could look at a local SIM or an eSIM temporarily, and hopefully it's just a local issue and will resolve itself soon.

[Mark]

I'm sorry to hear you're struggling to connect to 4/5g whist is Australia @Andy_7. If this issue's being experienced by more than one user, it maybe connected to the network you've roamed to. You can select another network manually by following the below instructions:

- Settings.

- Mobile data.

- Network Selection.

- Toggle this off Automatic. This will bring up a list of available networks.

- Select a different network.

- Exit the menu and restart your handset.

You may need to try more than 1 network to regain connection. 

If you've exhausted all the available networks and neither of you are able to connect, please reach out via Twitter again and we can look into raising an investigation for you.

[Andy_7]

This was part of the process i have been through 3 times now.  There are 3 other networks available in Sydney and none of them allow my phone / contract to access them.  Only Vodafone AU connects.

There is no issue with the network here, so this will not resolve itself.  I went into a Vodafone shop in Sydney, they checked everything on the iPhone for me, removed the SIM for a while, checked against their own phones, checked the network status.