Vodafone has provided an update on its voice and data services in Brisbane, Ipswich, Sunshine Coast, Gold Coast and affected rural area, stating that they have been fully restored, as of 1:45pm AEST.
"Vodafone’s exchange facility located in Coorparoo, QLD, has been affected by flooding. We are working hard to protect the site, with employees on the ground building a sandbag barrier against rising flood waters," the update reads.
The floods in Queensland have taken their toll on Vodafone’s network, with the telco reporting ongoing issues today.
In an update on its network status the telco informed customers that from 9.30am today, voice and data services for customers would be “partially unavailable due to flood and storm damage”.
In particular the Brisbane CBD, Brisbane metro, Sunshine Coast, Ipswich and rural parts of the state would be affected.
Vodafone has also reported network issues in the Northern Territory, with an unplanned service interruption being investigated related to users may be unable to access voice and data services in areas such as Darwin City, Palmerston, Katherine and Jabiru.
Today’s issues follow additional unplanned service interruptions in NSW, where customers experienced intermittent loss of voice and data services in the Sydney CBD, North Shore, Eastern Suburbs as well as rural NSW, Wollongong and northern NSW.
The issues are likely to fuel the current class action lawsuit being brought forward by law firm Piper Alderman, which seeks compensation for alleged charges to customers’ accounts when they have experienced calls dropping out, reception issues, and poor data performance.
In under a week the numbers of Vodafone customers participating in the action has grown from 9000 as of 5 January to 12,000 as of 10 January.
Rubbing more salt into the wounds is the news this week that the Australian Privacy Commissioner, Timothy Pilgrim, will be investigating the telco in the wake of allegations that it made the personal information of four million customers available on its website.
Vodafone has also pledged to improve its network, announcing it will upgrade or build more than 2500 base stations during 2011 in a bid to lift reliability and capacity.
Update
A Vodafone spokesperson said the current flood-related issue in Queensland was only affecting services for Vodafone customers, not 3 Mobile customers.
"Vodafone is currently experiencing a disruption to voice and data services in some parts of Queensland including Brisbane, Gold Coast and Rural areas," the spokesperson said.
"Vodafone’s transmission facility located in Coorparoo, QLD, has been affected by flooding.
"Our engineers are onsite and services are being restored. We expect full voice and data services within the next two hours, depending on weather conditions."
The Northern Territory issue is affecting seven sites and started at 7.33am this morning. Engineers are currently investigating the cause of the issue.
"At this time, the disruption to service for customers in affected areas on NT is ongoing," the spokesperson said. "We are working to resolve this issue and apologise for the inconvenience to customers."
Commenting on the disruption in Sydney, Wollongong and parts of rural NSW yesterday, the spokesperson said the "intermittent disruption" started at around 1.00pm and lasted for approximately one hour and was caused by a hardware fault. Services were restored by 2.03pm.
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