Roaming in Australia unavailable

Forums › One New Zealand (including Vodafone, WxC, Farmside) › Roaming in Australia unavailable

sloth

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#18088 26-Dec-2007 23:45

Hi

Not sure if anyone else has been affected by this but I'm on VFNZ and am over in Aussie - have been unable to connect to Vodafone Australia since around midday 25th Dec. Neither have 2 others with me. VFNZ say there is a global problem with roaming at the moment however have no estimate for resolution!!

Pretty unbelievable stuff really - I've never known of a network to be unavailable for this long.

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#101868 26-Dec-2007 23:50

Do you need your NZ simcards while you are over there?

It would be cheaper to buy Aussie simcards and use those to text/call eachother while you are there. Also, it means no-one can call you so you do not have to pay $$$$$ for an incoming international call, unless ofcourse you give them your Aussie phone number, and then they get to pay $$.

sloth

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#101869 26-Dec-2007 23:59

well, we used to have Aussie sim cards as well, but they've expired now and to be honest it was actually pretty cheap on our old roaming prices (we're on the old Motormouth prepay plans @ 49c/min). However I don't think this is the case any more since these were all changed on us. Looks like going back to Aussie SIMs might be the way to go!

sbiddle

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#101872 27-Dec-2007 06:52

My girlfriend flew home on Xmas day and has had no trouble using her PrePay phone over there.

johnr

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#101880 27-Dec-2007 09:14

capacity on the international links they get hammered on the 25/26 also 1/2 of Jan

sbiddle

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#101882 27-Dec-2007 10:12

There appear to be major problems roaming on VF only - any other network is fine. The phone just stays in SOS mode a lot of the time.

sloth

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#101901 27-Dec-2007 14:28

Just spoken to VFNZ customer service again as the problem still exists 2 days later!! I was told that they're trying to resolve this as a "highest priority" issue, but as yet don't have a time frame or solution. Apparently it's affecting almost all VFNZ customers roaming in Aussie and all VFAus customers roaming in NZ. They must be losing thousands of $ on this (and annoying everyone in the meantime).

There was however speak of compensation to all affected.

Surprised this hasn't made the news

sbiddle

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#101912 27-Dec-2007 15:56

I was just speaking to my GF before. Her phone is switched on and she is able to receive TXT's OK but has been receiving duplicates of most. She hasn't sent any since Xmas day however because she blatently refuses to pay 80c for something that used to cost 20c until VF did us all a favour and hiked all their roaming prices. Ringing her doesn't work however - the call just isn't connected.

I was also speaking to another friend earlier who told me his phone can't connect and that the phone goes into SOS mode / emergency calls only on Vodafone. You can however roam on any of the other networks fine.

I'd love to think it's a case of bad karma coming back to hit VF - hike your prices up to rip everybody off and bad things happen..

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#101920 27-Dec-2007 17:46

There is currently an issue with the "callHold" feature which may have side-affected some other services or roaming.

If you put the other party on hold, your phone states "call held" and the other party hears the standard Biiii BRRRRRR. sound.

If you then take them off "hold" your phone indicates the call is once again active and you can hear them, all they continue to hear is the same biiiii BRRRRR sound and no voice.

PenultimateHop

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#101923 27-Dec-2007 19:07

Amusing, but no surprise. This will mark yet another year where Vodafone roaming has broken over Christmas/New Years. It's certainly died for me in 2003/04, 2005/06, and 2006/07.

macjones

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#101940 27-Dec-2007 21:22

Same here, 3 family in Sydney (2 prepy and one on account), all have "no network or select network" coming up.

Tried on the prepay to select optus or telstra, but those say "emergency only".

On hold to VFNZ, she is going to "reset the phones on our network".......

3 mins....

5 mins....

9 mins....

OK

So she admitted that they are having problems (good)
Said she saw that our last usage was christmas day (true)
Said she'd reset the phones so that the network thinks they've just arrived in Australia (great)
Said they hoped they had it fixed at 5:30pm yesterday(26th), but were still getting calls.
Said that she could put the "on account phone" onto the "traveller" plan, which means that he can select Telstra or Optus
and pay the same rates as it he was on the VF network.

I told her that my family were all a bit pissed and wanted to buy Auzzie SIMs to keep in contact, could she offer a credit.....
YUP, she'd put $30 on each of the phones.

Calling sydney now.......

Nope, phone is still not working, (tried power off and on as well)

Geepers VF, biggest roaming destination, and biggest time of the year, oops.
\\
To make me feel a bit better she said it's also stuffed up the Auzzie GSM phones that are roaming here.

Cheers
Mac

PenultimateHop

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#101964 27-Dec-2007 22:28

macjones:
To make me feel a bit better she said it's also stuffed up the Auzzie GSM phones that are roaming here.

Must be VFAU inbound roaming then; my Telstra Australia phone is roaming fine on VFNZ right now with no hiccups. Inbound SMS is a little slow but that is entirely usual for Telstra.

sloth

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#101971 27-Dec-2007 22:52

you were lucky to get $30 out of them - I've just been told they won't offer anything at all as it's the fault of the overseas network (even though that's Vodafone Australia!)

Still no fix, still no end in sight.

If only there was another choice though - not as if I'm changing to Telecom!

nzbnw

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#101979 27-Dec-2007 23:49

Kiwi's and Aussie's are not alone (~~Out~~ Inbound roaming)... http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=885467

nzbnw

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#101992 28-Dec-2007 07:59

Spoke to Vodafone on Boxing Day, gist of the call was that I was silly I should realise that it was a busy time of the year and there were problems because of this...

That is gold

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#102008 28-Dec-2007 10:29

Spoke with Vodafone. This is a congestion issue and could be rectified by installing new hardware but they are unwilling to do this as it is expensive and only happens to the network at this time of year. They are just going to ride it out and monitor the congestion, despite the network being unusable since 10pm Christmas Eve and still unusable - well in breach of most SLA agreements. This is a dangerous position for anyone to be in if they need to make an emergency call in Australia - not to mention the effect on business and people staying in touch on holiday.

Unfortunately this will be an easy issue for them to blame on other Networks.

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