Signal Awful in Many Areas after Virgin Swapover, even where Virgin was Fine

[Thomas56]

As the title suggests.

I'm getting increasingly frustrated with O2's awful signal, even in areas where my signal was more than fine on Virgin Mobile. Home is mostly fine (though with extremely variable speeds), but outside of home it seems to be a coin flip whether I get signal or not.

I use my phone a lot, especially for Google Maps when travelling via car. On Virgin, I knew I could travel somewhere, set up my GPS, and return home. On O2, I am consistently having issues with Google Maps not loading - even when it says I have signal. Signal inconsistently jumps between H to 4G mostly, though sometimes even when it displays a letter/number for signal, it refuses to connect. This is in areas I've been to before, and know without a doubt that I never had an issue connecting to the GPS on Virgin Mobile. Before anyone suggests it's Google Maps or my GPS not working properly - WhatsApp messages also don't go through, and I can't load web pages, so I know it's the data not connecting despite the symbol being there.

And this happens in more than one location. Places I have visited several times, NEVER an issue on Virgin, and yet somehow on O2 I suddenly can't connect in that same place. It is frustrating, and with it being impossible to contact O2 outside of calling them (almost certainly to a member of staff who will have no idea what the issue would be) it is more than frustrating trying to deal with it.

I am at the point where I will consider leaving O2 at the end of my contract, and try another supplier due to the abysmal connection rates.

I have tried rebooting, I have tried resetting my APN, I've tried toggling aeroplane mode - at best they are a temporary fix, at worst they do nothing to improve the situation. It took me 20 minutes of driving earlier (in a city) to get enough signal to set up the GPS route, which is just unacceptable. It was only lucky I knew the rough route for the beginning of the journey.

Not to mention this is my third time trying to even post this due to their awful website, on top of everything else.

[pgn]

Are you still using the original Virgin SIM, @Thomas56? Some of them do not play well with O2's network, which you were migrated to about half a year ago now.

If you still have a VM SIM in your phone, drop into an O2 Shop with some photo id and get them to change you over to a full-blown O2 5G SIM.

Good luck!

[Thomas56]

Thanks for the suggestion.

I am on VM SIM, though someone else in my household did swap to an O2 SIM but still reports issues (though he doesn't use his phone for GPS to the same extent I do) so I might see if I can get to an O2 store. I wish there was an easy way to request a replacement on the website, instead of having to go to the store or call up about it.

[madasaf1sh]

@Thomas56 

They don't, and never have done, you either have to call or pop into a store, just one of the unique USP's of o2.

[BobsYourUncle]

O2 signal is generally awful and oversubscribed. Unfortunately it's unlikely to get better. The staff on the phones will play dumb and suggest all sorts of solutions but none of them will work.

[madasaf1sh]

@BobsYourUncle 

Same can be said on all the UK networks, in some places they all can be rubbish and oversubscribed.  
This isnt unique to o2 by any stretch...

I know of places that EE doesnt exist, or Vodafone, and 3...

[cosmoblivion]

I was wondering if this is my issue too. I was with virgin for a number of years...making the same kinds of facetime calls and imessages, as well as local calls, and using zoom, skype, so forth to keep in contact with family in other countries and to contact clients of mine in other countries. Virgin covered all of this under one monthly plan that never varied. As soon as the switch to O2 occurred, suddenly these same calls were being charged! at exorbitant prices too. I've been in a chat through twitter with an O2 customer rep...for three days or more. They did not want to be very helpful initially and now they are nicer about it but I can see (especially after reading all these issues in forums) that this truly is an O2 sim issue. And the poor customer service person has no answers.