What happened to leading the way on roaming...

[donnyguy]

Bit disappointed with Vodafone as of late. 

Launched 5G by proudly proclaiming "5G in more places". Looked great until you saw that they were claiming the 5G roll out of Vodafone ES, Vodafone DE, Vodafone IE and Vodafone IT as their own but never mind. 

What I'm surprised about is that things haven't moved on since then.

I have a work phone with EE and have been pleasantly surprised to see they've launched 5G roaming (even if they don't shout about it) so have seen 5G coverage (from personal experience) in Ireland, Spain, France and Greece. 

I'm currently in the States, and was pleasantly surprised to see that EE offer 5G roaming on AT&T. Not only that, they have 4G and 5G calling live too. Same in Canada (went there last weekend).

Vodafone on the other hand seem to have completely dropped the ball and don't yet offer 4G calling in a country where 3G networks are being switched off.

So you can still pay £6 per day post paid or bolt on a calls/text/data package for prepaid but don't expect to be able to use the calls part - definitely a fail. 

Really is time to up the game and reclaim the top spot. For a network I've always stayed loyal to because you lead the way on roaming, you really have lost it. 

[BandOfBrothers]

I don't roam personally but I do keep up with most of the news from Vodafone and from other networks too.

I agree @donnyguy that the network should really up their game on what they already provide. 

More and more people are now going away on holiday and business trips so will look to want to use their services.

[simax]

It’s not even roaming that Vodafone have dropped the ball on… 5G in the UK seems to have completely stalled. We have a Vodafone/O2 (CTIL) street mast up the road from us and this was granted permission by the council two and a half years ago to have an upgrade to 5G and super fast 4G (I believe it’s only using 4G on 800/900MHz at present). Since then, after contacting CTIL, I’ve since discovered the plans to upgrade the mast have been shelved and are now not going ahead. The same seems to be the case for other sites in Plymouth. The coverage map seems to confirm this - it used to show planned 5G coverage as quite a wide area…. It now shows planned 5G coverage as being identical to what we have now - and that hasn’t changed in a few years. My wife and kids are on EE and they’re getting 5G now across nearly all the city and beyond.

Really isn’t acceptable, especially as we’ve just incurred a 9.3% increase in all our bills for “investment”. Part of me thinks that means investment in hedge funds rather than network infrastructure.

Suffice to say - contract up on 24th October and options are now being looked at.

[step_hen]

Here's my experience of roaming in the US in May, and Vodafone's abysmal response:

https://forum.vodafone.co.uk/t5/Pay-monthly/Call-problems-in-the-US/td-p/2708599

[Getafix]

@donnyguy

To solve a problem, you have to accept there is one. Until very recently everyone in Vodafone (well almost everyone) have been denying that there is an issue. And when they realised there was an issue, then Blame it on AT&T. AT&T switched off 3G without informing people who will probably roaming in USA soon.
And then admit that they need to do something, now it will take a long time as not really a priority.

I am going to travel to USA in two weeks time and was going to ask for Update, but now I have the answer.

[donnyguy · Accepted solution]

Some really good replies to this thread and it seems we're all in agreement.

For the USA, it wasn't a surprise that 3G networks were being switched off. A lot of countries around the world are switching off their 3G networks this year, Vodafone networks included so there really isn't an excuse for what can only be described as an epic fail 

You're right @Getafix , they've obviously been backed into a corner if they've had to write an entire page on "Roaming changes" (the page AnnS references) which despite the spin, is an admission that Vodafone were caught sleeping here. 

It's all very well telling your customers to use wifi calling (if they're connected to wifi) but it doesn't make it clear that you won't be receiving incoming calls either if you're not in a 2G coverage area of T-Mobile.

It wouldn't be as insulting if they weren't still charging a premium for the service, either £6 per day for contract customers or £15/£25 bolt on for pre-paid customers.

Wonder if there's grounds for a refund (or at least a partial refund) for customers paying for this "service".

My solution has been to divert all the incoming calls on my Vodafone line to my EE line. That way I'm not dropping calls and they're being routed by EE over 5G on the AT&T network.

But back to my other point, I find it strange that there's been no change to 5G roaming for Vodafone UK customers since they launched it in 2019. It's the same small number of countries. Meanwhile other networks have matched and then increased their footprint. Same with UK coverage. EE constantly increase their footprint, Vodafone don't seem to. All they've done is drop the "5G in more places" messaging from the website.

It's no big deal for me, I've worked around it this time but I'd love to see Vodafone re-claim the top spot for roaming.

[chistery]

Probably waiting till they get a decision on the Three merger before spending more money.

A few years ago roaming was great with Vodafone, it was priced competitively and there was a range of plans. Now only a very small number have the 83 countries included and prices have rocketed whilst customer service has gone down the pan.

Two weeks in America on Vodafone - that's £84. On EE it's £5. 🤔

If you want to roam, Vodafone isn't the network to be on.

[Getafix]

@histery

Only 2 top SIM Only Tariffs have 83 Roaming included £39 and £34 max 10mbps download speed.
Although not showing on the Website, there is a Hidden Tariff which has Entertainment for £7 more.
Not sure if Entertainment can be added to the Limited Speed Tariff.

Not everyone is after Unlimited Data.