[INJAXN]

I am !dea since last 7 years.
Internet speed was never as bad as it is today, might be because of idea Vodafone merger.
I am planning to get a second number, from jio, and move from idea postpaid to prepaid.

[adi.mariner]

I recently changed over to Airtel (from Tata Docomo) for my Wife. I had gotten her an Idea SIM during the transition. The Idea call and data reception is pathetic in the area. Calls do not go through and you have to sit in the balcony for using the Data. The Airtel network is comparatively better and there is call/data connectivity in all rooms. I haven't used Vodafone or Jio and have no idea about the same. The networks are 4G but the download/upload speeds are nowhere close to the advertised ones.

[srinivasgv]

I have not gone through the posts in the thread but what I can say is, the reception depends on the surroundings as well. For my flat we are having a large open land and a railway track. There is an Airtel tower after the track and I get a good signal most of the time due to a tower near to me and and vacant land. But, my neighbors who stay in the flat opposite to us complain about Airtel signal. So, in my understanding, its based on how much open area we are having around our flat to allow the signal waves. Whenever I visit my cousin's house or even in my old office I used to get frustrated by the signal, those are just cement Jungles.

[lrsays]

I've used Airtel, Jio, Vodafone, Tata and BSNL in Bangalore. Airtel and Vodafone are much better than BSNL but all of them have blind spots specially in high density area. Recently I notices that inside office building network speed is low and calls are getting disconnected, Even after many requests/complaints BSNL and Airtel were not acting on it, then I sent an e-mail to AGM and e-mail IDs listed here and to my surprise got a call back within a day followed by site visit by engineers. BSNL changed direction of nearest antenna to reduce call drops inside office building and Airtel installed repeaters inside building which improved signal strength and call drops have reduced a lot.

[bharatbits]

Have been with Jio since they launched and have in general been happy with it. In very very crowded places or busy junctions have experienced slow speed but that has been very rare. Switched from Docomo since they didn't have 4G.

Jio's pricing also keeps me happy. Have taken multiple Jio connections for myself, work and moved the entire family to Jio.

[Malyaj]

If you are someone who spends your day in 2 different parts of the city, it is likely that one of those places will give you a headache. It is clear that in this race there are only losers.

What frustrates me is how 3G and 4G were advertised during their respective launches and what a whimper they turned out to be. Phones and apps have also become data hungry and networks have always been playing catch up in India. With reluctance to invest in infra, I don't see this changing any time soon

[rahuljmr]

Originally Posted by fordday

This is in Bangalore. Are other cities facing it?

Facing similar problems in Chennai as well. Not just internet connectivity. At times even calls go through!

My workaround to retaining my decade old airtel phone number is using a Jio sim and mapping the phone to use internet from sim slot 2 !

[avi550m]

Has anyone been facing mobile data connectivity of Vodafone in Bangalore for the past 2 weeks. Last Sunday my mobile data was connecting and disconnecting every 10 seconds. I tried all the usual methods, switching on off, toggling airplane mode, taking out the sim and resinserting but the issue persisted. It only affected mobile data as I could make calls no problem. I put my jio sim and it worked fine and put the Vodafone sim in the old phone and the same problem occurred.

Finally after some time it suddenly started working properly again. Today afternoon when I went out I again found the same issue occurring. My jio sim is now In the phone as well and it’s mobile data worked flawlessly. Has anyone else been facing this issue of frequent mobile data disconnections with Vodafone. I really do not want to got to a Vodafone store and their IVR does not even allow me to talk to a real person.

[Sree73]

I have an issue with Vodafone SIM. Many days I will not be able to call Kerala Landline (BSNL) Numbers from Vodafone (calling from Bangalore). If same numbers are called from Airtel / JIO, call goes through without any trouble.

Tried calling other states landline numbers like Mumbai / Delhi etc. from Vodafone. No issues and can make successful calls.

Issue is only for Kerala landline numbers (Most of the days). Calls go through only on few days. Taken up with Vodafone. Was not able to resolve.

Living with the problem as there are multiple other numbers at disposal and hence this is not a bottleneck.

Not very clear what is the root cause of this anomaly.

[saket77]

Facing a troublesome issue with Airtel 4G since last two months. Wasn’t the case before. The data connection keeps dropping at irregular interval. To get back data connection, either I need to wait for it to resume which is normally 2-5 minutes or switch the phone to flight mode and back. This resumes data. However the ‘4G’ symbol is displayed on the top screen as normal throughout; even when data isn’t working. My device is iPhone 6S.

I’ve put forward a complaint to Airtel but the way the guy on other side took my complain, I have no hopes of getting it resolved. He asked just for my pin code (not even about my device) and mine covers at least a radius of 4kms. I’m not sure how they can resolve if they don’t know my exact location; if it’s a location specific issue. I’m assuming it to be one rather than issue with the entire network in the city.

Off topic but today I got to know that Airtel charges you money to speak to the customer care representative! It’s not much at 50p for 3 minutes, but still, I need to pay to put forward a genuine complain. That’s new in this age for me.

[smartindboy]

In my usage and across my family circle (in and around Hyderabad and the telugu states), Jio is better than Airtel, and Vodafone, in that order.

[poloman]

Most of 4G bands are prone to heavy losses due to buildings and obstacles. So the operators have to form smaller cells. They are not doing this due to high capital expenses and general poor finances of telecom vendors. That is why at least the call quality was much better in 2G which had better penetration over obstacles.

To make things worse you have huge congestion in the network due to increased demand for data due to WFH.

[ninjatalli]

Originally Posted by saket77

I’ve put forward a complaint to Airtel but the way the guy on other side took my complain, I have no hopes of getting it resolved. He asked just for my pin code (not even about my device) and mine covers at least a radius of 4kms. I’m not sure how they can resolve if they don’t know my exact location; if it’s a location specific issue. I’m assuming it to be one rather than issue with the entire network in the city.

This is a dated view from my experience of working in the telecom industry nearly a decade ago. But the process used to be that the customer care would record network complaints from users and share that with the passive infrastructure team - either this would be within the Telcom organization or with a 3rd party organization like Indus Towers.

There would be a check to see if there are multiple number of issues reported in that area; once a sizeable number of complaints are received, an effort is made for the technicians to visit on-ground and improve / correct the issue. Usually before that happens, the user(s) would receive a call from an internal team to gather more exact location details. Normally the call center team doesn't do that, however network coverage issues were given high priority within the organization.

I have seen this happen from both sides - as part of the servicing side as well as a mobile user complaining about bad network coverage.

If they don't reach out within the next few days to get your location details, then I guess the service has gone down wrt giving priority to such issues.

[gusfring]

Noticed something strange now. Had an unlimited package with Vodafone... er, Vi. Expired, and now I want to keep just talktime since I have good connection speeds via WiFi. Did that, but now it tells me I have to charge via Unlimited plans only to continue using the phone itself. This seems like extortion to me.

This the case with other providers, or just these people?

[MadAxe]

Originally Posted by gusfring

Noticed something strange now. Had an unlimited package with Vodafone... er, Vi. Expired, and now I want to keep just talktime since I have good connection speeds via WiFi. Did that, but now it tells me I have to charge via Unlimited plans only to continue using the phone itself. This seems like extortion to me.

This the case with other providers, or just these people?

Nah.You have complete choice of the recharge that you want to do. They can't deny you the services if you're using a talktime only recharge. That's violation of net neutrality. Rest assured you will be able to use your smartphone with talktime recharge only.