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Vodacom denies network failure

By Christelle du Toit, ITWeb senior journalist
Johannesburg, 12 Nov 2007

Vodacom has denied allegations that its network was down across the country on Friday, potentially affecting millions of customers.

Customer complaints from across the country filed into consumer Web sites such as hellopeter.com and mybroadband.co.za, on Friday afternoon. They complained about a lack of network coverage on the Vodacom network.

On hellopeter.com, Vodacom responded to a number of the complaints lodged, by saying: "Our network division has confirmed there was a problem with one of the platforms, however, this has been resolved." The mobile operator apologised for any inconvenience caused and asked customers to switch their handsets off and on again to update their location on the network.

This morning Vodacom chief communications officer Dot Field said the Vodacom network was not down on Friday: "A small percentage of Vodacom prepaid customers experienced difficulty in making calls when they moved from one base station to another, for a very limited period on Friday afternoon."

She would not give further details, saying: "It is not our policy to explain network issues to such a degree, or to elaborate on the numbers affected."

The complaints lodged online, however, related to contract and pre-paid Vodacom clients, as well as Internet services such as 3G and 2G.

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