All of the UK’s major mobile operators reported faults just as many people were being urged to work from home.
This week the UK government increased measures to limit the spread of the COVID-19 virus, advising that any household where someone shows even mild flu-like symptoms should self-isolate for 14 days. With the usual seasonal colds and flu circulating, that guidance potentially affects a large number of households.
Luckily, most modern businesses have established remote working arrangements, enabling employees who feel well enough to continue working and helping to keep services and operations running during this global health emergency.
Remote work is more feasible than ever thanks to the range of connectivity options available—when those services are functioning.
On the morning in question, millions of people found they could not make phone calls starting around the typical 9am start of the working day. The outage affected customers on O2, EE, Vodafone, Three, Virgin Media, Tesco Mobile, GiffGaff and BT.
EE issued a statement explaining the cause: “A technical incident with equipment that connects the UK’s mobile networks together has caused some customers to have problems making phone calls today.”
Reports to Downdetector began at about 9:14am and continued until nearly 2pm.
Operators attributed the disruption to interconnect issues between networks rather than to a direct effect of increased home working during the coronavirus pandemic.
O2 was initially named as the source of the problem, but the company rejected that claim and said the fault was a cross-industry issue affecting multiple providers.
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