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3 have terrible service!
- Thread starter AppleCallum
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Bought a second iPad yesterday, upgraded to the 3G version. I decided to use 3 as I have a broadband dongle which always give excellent connection speed where I live.
Nightmare trying to get the call centre woman to understand me, I am from the North East, but I have a clear telephone voice, not only did it take an hour to complete a 10 minute call I was becoming more and more frustrated. Telephone line was terrible, I was sure there was a riot going on in the background at one point! Both numbers and letters were misunderstood, my card was declined as she entered the wrong numbers etc
The end product however is great, faster than my home broadband (crappy connection speed where I live), I no longer have to put up with dropped wifi connection (I now know this is down to my Belkin router, stayed at my daughters in Sheffield and their Linksys didn't drop connection once).
Think I may be buying an iPhone 4 on the 3 network, both O2 and Orange have dodgy speeds in my area. I will be testing my iPad to make sure that I choose the right network I think and hope I don't need customer services!
Nightmare trying to get the call centre woman to understand me, I am from the North East, but I have a clear telephone voice, not only did it take an hour to complete a 10 minute call I was becoming more and more frustrated. Telephone line was terrible, I was sure there was a riot going on in the background at one point! Both numbers and letters were misunderstood, my card was declined as she entered the wrong numbers etc
The end product however is great, faster than my home broadband (crappy connection speed where I live), I no longer have to put up with dropped wifi connection (I now know this is down to my Belkin router, stayed at my daughters in Sheffield and their Linksys didn't drop connection once).
Think I may be buying an iPhone 4 on the 3 network, both O2 and Orange have dodgy speeds in my area. I will be testing my iPad to make sure that I choose the right network I think and hope I don't need customer services!
I had heard they had got their act together now. I did a number transfer to them a few weeks ago and it went like clockwork. The foreign chap was very easy to understand and he understood everything I said with no repetitions. The job was done within two days as he said it would be. My son did the same thing a day or so later with no trouble either. I think it might have been an idea to put the phone down and ring in again, you might have got one of the bad ones. If you got a PAYG sim like I did then there is no need to phone in, just plug in and go. I got a 12month SIM with 12GB of data on it from eBay for £36. Very pleased. Trim it with scissors and your good to go. I would never have a contract off them again as it's nigh on impossible to get them to let you go.
The girl I spoke to when I called to activate my SIM was from Durban, South Africa. She was very friendly (verging on flirtatious!) and very easy to understand. The whole process took about half an hour but worked perfectly after that. I think they've upped their game after seeing just how many iPad users are coming to 3.
Theirs another three 'offer' this is on pay as go, basically get a pay as you go sim, then trim it down, make sure you sign up to my three first. Then add the internet add on which is £5, they do have a fair usage policy, but technically they market it as unlimited. The fair usage says they will take action after 1gb, but it actually is 2gb.
£5 a month for 2gb, not too bad. On pay as you go, so no call centers to deal with.
£5 a month for 2gb, not too bad. On pay as you go, so no call centers to deal with.
Just got one of those 12gb for a year sims off eBay for £30 - just made a few best offers until a seller accepted at that.
Came today, cut it to size, popped it in, got a full 3G signal in about 15 secs. Using it right now.
No activation, no account, no call centre.
Result!
Came today, cut it to size, popped it in, got a full 3G signal in about 15 secs. Using it right now.
No activation, no account, no call centre.
Result!
Be careful with that. The offer two kinds of sim, one for a phone and one for internet only. Like a dongle or MIFI. The phone one has unlimited internet but is not to be used in a dongle or MIFI. If they detect it, and they can, then they will either disconnect it or block the device. Also if you use one in an iPhone make sure you have 3G turned on. If you dont you will find the phone may get blocked. You can't use the internet only sim in an iPhone. It's designed for 3G data only.
It's fine, I know theirs two types.
Both actually cost the same amount.
But to get the Internet only sim is £5 a month on a rolling contract, which is more call centres to deal with. The pay as you go sim (for a normalnphone) should be fine in a iPad,still £5 add on, for basically the same thing.
They will still get my money, just want the least hassle based one.
Can always get another sim if they block the sim.
It was third time lucky for me - two terrible experiences calling them, and one good one - but what I read here and elsewhere suggests Three's customer service is still far too variable to be considered sorted.
Pity. If they could crack this (or obviate it altogether, by offering on-device activation/management), they'd be the best choice for both the iPad and the iPhone 4 in the UK.
How come you have to ring up to activate?
If you buy online trough their website wont it already be activated?
If you buy online trough their website wont it already be activated?
Negative.
You have to call India for credit checking and to set up your direct debit for payment, none of which (inexplicably) can be done online or in their stores.
It seems that 3 are also using call centres in South Africa. Activated mine this morning, took about 15 mins.
well been on o2 for a month and love the on device activation but not too happy with the picture compression etc but speeds of around .5meg were not great.
Had 3 sim sitting there for a few weeks so thought would give it a go. Just come off phone, took all of 10 mins, very suprised given this thread but was no probs and guy spoke fairly good english, just waiting now to activate. do i need to enter APN settings?
Will report back sppeds etc as work i Newcastle. live at coast ( W Bay)
Had 3 sim sitting there for a few weeks so thought would give it a go. Just come off phone, took all of 10 mins, very suprised given this thread but was no probs and guy spoke fairly good english, just waiting now to activate. do i need to enter APN settings?
Will report back sppeds etc as work i Newcastle. live at coast ( W Bay)
Well i have to give 3 credit. Signup was simple and its all working within half an hour of signing up for service.
speeds of 2.5mb down which whips o2 in my area and no image compression.
Also i signed up for 10 meg / month and my account has credit of 11.8 meg so that s good as well
really happy..... will keep o2 sim as you never know but all good so far!!
speeds of 2.5mb down which whips o2 in my area and no image compression.
Also i signed up for 10 meg / month and my account has credit of 11.8 meg so that s good as well
really happy..... will keep o2 sim as you never know but all good so far!!
three.co.uk and no user name or password. But I just checked on my iPad and APN is empty and it still works.
3 download speed in Central London - absolute rubbish
I was hoping that your experience in London would be a one-off, but I can confirm that my 3 micro-SIM gets an average download speed of just 116Kbps in Central London, vs. 1974Kbps on my Orange micro-SIM. That's a 17-fold speed difference, and I am quite simply astonished that 3 can be so slow! Time to phone Mumbai and cancel that contract!!!!
I was hoping that your experience in London would be a one-off, but I can confirm that my 3 micro-SIM gets an average download speed of just 116Kbps in Central London, vs. 1974Kbps on my Orange micro-SIM. That's a 17-fold speed difference, and I am quite simply astonished that 3 can be so slow! Time to phone Mumbai and cancel that contract!!!!
Good luck. Once you start talking cancelling contracts their command of English goes right out of the window.
Having travelled more widely since my last post, I can confirm that London Village is the worst Three speed blackspot. Nearly everywhere else I've been in the UK I've enjoyed >1Mbps, and usually >2Mbps. Makes a change from the usual scenario of coverage being great in the capital and so-so elsewhere.
I feel your pain.
3's call centre has been using Bangalore's finest for a few years. When I was converting from 3 to O2 (for my iPhone), I got called every day from someone offering me this deal and that to stay. One of them even told me the Nokia N95 was better than the iPhone.
To be fair, quite a lot of the commenters on here think that as well.
Do you realise Three use O2 as their backup provider if you are in areas without Three signal? so in reality if anything it should be better than O2.....
There's an invitation on the Three Blog to submit postcodes where speeds are poor for further investigation:
http://blog.three.co.uk/2010/05/25/data-plans-for-ipad-from-three/#comments
Worth a try?