Three's fall from grace - Broken promises and broken dreams
Everything Goes
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Having spent many years improving its initial low ratings, mostly due to customer service and coverage issues. This year Three have had an amazing fall from grace. Constantly shooting themselves in the foot and pissing off customers.
It all started at the end of 2013 with their 4G rollout. The rollout turned out to be an extended closed test which didn't start properly until 2014. Then came the famous 4G Wish List. As the year progressed became apparent it had become a pipe dream as Three changed their strategy. The rollout has been piecemeal at best even when there was coverage. Then Three decided to cap speeds at 50Mbps. By the end of 2014 Three issued a revised 4G rollout for 2015. Amazingly they removed 193 of the towns / cities they didn't bother with in 2014 (or 194 if you include Hull). They did add 59 new sites including Airports! Lets see how 2015 goes......
Comparison List here:
https://www.diffchecker.com/opybv7j7
Now the Tariffs. Three had started increasing the promotional price of the One Plan. Then they removed The One Plan completely and plans now have a maximum 4GB Tethering limit. Price plans change we all know it. Three were clearly feeling the pinch over excessive data usage and wanted to change it.
The next bit has never happened on any UK network. Three decided to terminate all Grandfather plans. This really is unheard of. People who were outwith their commitment have been and will be moved to another plan. One with a maximum 4GB Tethering limit. Obviously this hasn't gone down well. People may find themselves paying more for less or have to cut back and go on a lower tariff or simply leave! What's more Three have decided to play hardball and offer pretty much no discounts other than perhaps £1 if your lucky.
Three appear to be under some pressure from their parent company Hutchison to improve revenue and cut costs.
While these changes my not impact on everyone Three seem to be on a path to place themselves as a premium network. The thing is if you want a premium network then EE is the place to go.
2015 Will be an interesting year with possible takeovers of EE and O2. So it will likely be an interesting year.
It all started at the end of 2013 with their 4G rollout. The rollout turned out to be an extended closed test which didn't start properly until 2014. Then came the famous 4G Wish List. As the year progressed became apparent it had become a pipe dream as Three changed their strategy. The rollout has been piecemeal at best even when there was coverage. Then Three decided to cap speeds at 50Mbps. By the end of 2014 Three issued a revised 4G rollout for 2015. Amazingly they removed 193 of the towns / cities they didn't bother with in 2014 (or 194 if you include Hull). They did add 59 new sites including Airports! Lets see how 2015 goes......
Comparison List here:
https://www.diffchecker.com/opybv7j7
Now the Tariffs. Three had started increasing the promotional price of the One Plan. Then they removed The One Plan completely and plans now have a maximum 4GB Tethering limit. Price plans change we all know it. Three were clearly feeling the pinch over excessive data usage and wanted to change it.
The next bit has never happened on any UK network. Three decided to terminate all Grandfather plans. This really is unheard of. People who were outwith their commitment have been and will be moved to another plan. One with a maximum 4GB Tethering limit. Obviously this hasn't gone down well. People may find themselves paying more for less or have to cut back and go on a lower tariff or simply leave! What's more Three have decided to play hardball and offer pretty much no discounts other than perhaps £1 if your lucky.
Three appear to be under some pressure from their parent company Hutchison to improve revenue and cut costs.
While these changes my not impact on everyone Three seem to be on a path to place themselves as a premium network. The thing is if you want a premium network then EE is the place to go.
2015 Will be an interesting year with possible takeovers of EE and O2. So it will likely be an interesting year.
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Three's 4G coverage in my area is dreadful. I can't get it at all.
BT with EE & then Vodafone with whoever they buy will be two huge problems for them with a proposition for the household they cant get close to matching.
Its going to be a very interesting 12-18months
Frome
Salisbury
Winchester
Eastleigh
Devizes
Andover
Newbury
I found that in this area Three was very congested and, bizarrely for a busy town, the bulk of the town has not yet been upgraded to DC-HSDPA yet alone 4G. I kept them in mind because 4G was supposedly coming by the end of 2014.
Now, in the past weeks, the tariffs have changed to be much less attractive and the promise of 4G has been delayed.
We have all seen in the past what happens when a network stops investing. Three is turning into the O2 of 2008/2009.
(Incidentally in my tests EE came out top, followed by O2)
Poor indoor coverage
No 2g backup
Congested 3G in most areas
No 4g network for most
Useless 4g in areas where availible, weak signal, few masts which are congested, slow speeds with high pings..
Too many restrictions on how data can be used.
But hey, wait...at least if three don't have all this they still provide cheap unlimited data yeah... That's there USP then right?
Errr no, they've just wacked there prices up and done away unlimited tethering, plus manage what data you can use via traffic sense..
So no point really for many...
Roll on May when I can leave, my trial with EE has been a revelation, might ring and see if I can jump ship earlier due to taking stone off the 4g list and me being a dirty one plan user, which they now hate.
Sad,
2013 = best network for the Internet
2015 = worst network
Well done three that's some going! So much for the big pipes and the network built for the Internet....
Explain why!
There's no point in a large rant post if you don't actually give any reasoning behind your points.
EE is more expensive than Three in virtually every scenario.
I don't see that ever changing.
A premium network usually comes with a premium price tag.
With EE you get
2G fallback
good indoor coverage
wider availability of 4G
an ultra fast 4G network
good 3G
...it's just a mobile network :eek:
There's more than a touch of hyperbole about this thread!
But thats all it is, making a decision about a mobile phone network whose new business plan now make them untenable for me, but I don't see it as being personal - Life goes on
Its a shame that Three have made these choices, but those are their decisions and not ours, maybe i'll be back in the future when / if they adopt the approach of most of the other networks, and start giving monthly data allowances which can be used for handset and tethering, using their monthly data 'ration' as the CUSTOMER chooses. Not everybody wants (or can physically) stare at a 5" phone or 7" tablet screen for hours on end, so for them, AYCE handset data is pretty pointless.
I'm not saying that Three should end AYCE data, all i'm hoping is that they introduce some additional tariffs in the future, which perhaps offer 15gb - 20gb of monthly data instead of AYCE, but whose data can be used upto the monthly limit on any device which the customer feels comfortable with.
In the interim, i'm cheerfully using EE's 100GB x 2 months sim, and through them I have enough data to last me until at least March without paying a penny, so once my notice period ends with '3' early next month, i'll just sit back and give it a few months to see what evolves from the other networks (potentially EE) and i'll put the money that i'm saving from no longer paying '3' towards my next 'plan'
If nothing does change next year, i'll probably just go with a Mobile Broadband Sim from EE for around £20 a month, on a 30 day contract so I can easily change again in the future. I can just stick a PAYG sim in my phone for emergency use, I don't see too many problems getting a network who can support my average of 2 mins of calls and 0 texts per month.
Agreed, I have.
Unfortunately I doubt enough people will do so to make Three see the error of their ways.
Jabbamk1 has seen the new price plans and even he thinks Three are aiming towards a premium priced network. You just have to look at the price increases this year alone. The gap between Three and EE is narrowing.
The "broken dreams" is aimed at Three's infamous 4G wishlist. Not sure if you have seen it or you would understand. See link I posted.
The way three are moving people off old plans means that i have little trust in threes future plans, what will change in the fututre? can they be trusted?
In some towns they're even beating EE!
Wasn't the original list published when Three were planning nationwide 1800? Now they are planning to roll out nationally on 800 from next year. If so, is it not possible that this list is just going to be places covered by 1800. Perhaps Three have decided that for the towns removed from the list that 800 would be enough to offer coverage which would also roll out next year and so have just done a quick edit job of their list!
Not making any excuses for Three here- just putting out the possibility that (not for the first time) Three may be guilty of poor miscommunication!
My 3G slows down in London, gets congested and the 4G takes up the strain but if I can't access it, it's not a major issue. I'd love 4G where I live and in my surrouding area but 3G serves does the job, in real world application it's mainly messaging, Facebook and a bit of Spotify, if it doesn't work I can wait to get home or onto a WiFi hotspot.
I've used Feel at Home since I travel a lot to their countries, was happy when they added Tube Wi-Fi (I'm aware other networks were there before them), for the price I pay I get unlimited (non-tethered data) plus enough minutes.
There's still blackspots in their network, some near me, In Touch isn't perfect but a as good a compromise as you're going to get, and I've been places where other users on O2/Voda have struggled to get signal when mine is fine or suffer chronic congestion (Birmingham Airport Hilton) when my 3G speeds were great.
It's disappointing to read all these posts about Three, and I can understand you feel let down and they lose out when you vote to go elsewhere, I'll stick by them, maybe I'm more tolerant to what they've done and other users like other posters demand service, but for what I pay it's great value for money - I'm not an employee of 3, it's just my opinion.
:rolleyes: