Vodafone Outage - Compensation Request Form - Cat Smith

In July, I challenged o2 on the poor signal across Lancaster and helped customers to secure compensation, as they advised their site had been vandalised and their engineers were working to fix the problem. They have since informed me that this is a Vodafone site, not their own.

The Vodafone status checker for some months now has been advising:

Businesses rely on good connectivity to ensure that they can operate and serve the community, whilst consumers need to stay connected with their families and friends and ensure they can get on with the basics like booking health appointments, banking, accessing Universal Credit and keeping on top of all of the essential life admin.

So, I’m challenging Vodafone to get the issue fixed, and I am calling upon all Vodafone customers to call for compensation here:

Make a complaint to Vodafone

Full email text

Dear Vodafone,

As a customer of your network in the Lancaster area I am appalled by the level of mobile data and signal coverage.

This issue has been acutely worse over the past few months, with both indoor and outdoor signal regularly low or completely absent.

The Vodafone signal checker confirms mass outages of 2G, 4G, and 5G across the whole of the city area, which Vodafone have been slow to fix.

For some months now, the Vodafone signal checker has advised "There’s a problem with our mobile network in this area at the moment that may be causing issues with your service. We’re sorry if you’re experiencing any disruption, we know how frustrating this can be. Rest assured, we’re working hard to get things up and running again as quickly as we can."

Given the very poor level of coverage and the difficulties I have had in accessing data, I am requesting a refund to compensate for the level of service I have simply not received from the company.

I look forward to your response.

CC: Cat Smith MP

Yours sincerely,

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UPDATE 19/09/2025 – Vodafone response

The site which serves central Lancaster has been offline since the 6^th June. This is also when we became aware of the outage.

The site is located on a derelict building approx. 50 metres behind the Royal Kings Arms Hotel. The reason for the outage is that the site has been repeatedly vandalised on numerous occasions as the building on top of which the site is located is not secured.

The action is currently with the site owner to secures the premises (all doors and windows). Once this has been done, we will be able to restore the site. The plan is to then monitor the site closely for further vandalism as if it continues, we may be forced to move the site which will potentially cause further disruption. I can ensure you that our network team have be working hard to bring this site back online.

There is currently no timeline for restoration as we are still waiting for the site provider to secure the site – one this has been done we will be able to confirm timelines.

Our customers may be eligible for compensation. They can enquire by contacting our customer care team on 191 from a Vodafone mobile, or on 0333 304 0191 on any other device.

Regarding emergency alerts, it is important to note that in the event of a national emergency, Government does not solely rely on the mobile network to convey messaging. Government advice states that emergency alerts will not replace local news, radio, television, or social media.

I will continue to monitor the situation, and I shall write back to you as soon as the network team update me.

I will be reaching out to Lancaster City Council to ask what pressure could be brought to bear from them on the owner of the derelict building to secure the site from other vandalism or environmental health perspectives, in order to get Vodafone to move more quickly on fixing the broken mast.