Is there anyone with long-term experience of Three 4G home broadband?

[Nick_A]

I was about to sign up for three home broadband until I came across the Trustpilot  broadband reviews site.

It's alarming to see that just in the first 10-20 reviews alone .... the comments from most users include the words "Terrible"  "Avoid" and "Rubbish". Some of these reviews were written just a few days ago.  The overall user rating for the service is just a very sad 1.7 out of 5.  I couldn't read more than about 15 or so of those on the first page because it was too depressing. And there are 80 or more further pages!

I am concerned that, just as some of the reviewers have experienced, that I will get through the 30 day trial period satisfactorily but then find, as some have done...... that after 5 weeks or so the service goes down the toilet. And then I'm stuck with paying off a two year contract for a bad service.

I don't think that is an unreasonable concern is it?

Is there any evidence of  similarly large numbers of users who have positive rather than negative experiences?

I thank you in advance of any advice and information received.

Nick

[Nick_A]

Paul

Thank you very much for you response - very kind of you. Sorry to hear of your 5G experiences.  But since I'm only looking for 4G I'm naturally very curious to know exactly how you established the location of the mast.....  Maybe you got that from customers services? That's unlikely I would have thought  - bearing in mind the poor repuattion they seem to have. Does it have some identification on the  mast itself maybe? I would have thought they would prefer to keep this kind of information secret for security purposes. Please let me know how you knew about yours ..... I'd love to find out how far I am from the nearset mast. Thanks again.

[Avondale]

I use Cellmapper but there are other similar websites. You'll find it easily via Google.

If you need more technical help or assistance in interpreting what Cellmapper tells you, please post on the forum of ISP Review. I know quite a bit about this sort of thing, but there are guys on there who have immense knowledge. That includes how to get more out of the kit that you already have.   

[Spud]

We have had a 4G ZTE MF286D since May '22 and it has been excellent. Usually 100Mbps download, might drop to 40 at busy times. We trialed it for free six months before we were out of contract with Shell  Broadband.

We are on the east edge of 3,000 population village and about 1Km from the mast, almost line of sight but for a few trees. I think most people connect to a nearer mast on the west side.

[Nick_A]

Thanks for your response Spud.

Wow! You are getting even more than than the Three retail outlet have quoted as the absolute maximum. (i.e. 70mbps)

I'm hoping the "ZTE MF286D" that you mentioned is the model of the router - if so, I will look up the specs. Thanks again.

[Spud]

When it's good it's good ... and often excellent like this lunchtime - I measured on Google maps and we're actually 1.9Km from the mast so I can't expect much more from 4G. Currently connecting with a secondhand Three Sercomm 4G router from eBay that is doing Carrier Aggregation on upload which sometimes gives 30Mbps upload (MF286D hardware can do this but current Three firmware doesn't implement it as far as I am aware and gives 6-10Mbps upload, 15 at best where I am).

[Techlec]

I have been using three's 4g/5g broadband for just over 4 year (living on a farm with a rubbish 6.5mb sky connection, and no chance for fibre or cable). At first I had the huawei AI cube and picked up around 70mb/30mb download and upload respectively. probably had the connection go down once a year for a day (for maintenance). The 4G probably peaked at around 120mb. 

Just as i was going to upgrade i realised I had 5G in the area, from a mast 400m away (picked up on my iphone 12) it took a number of calls to convince Three of this and send me a 5G router (huawei CPE Pro) and I sit around 200mb/15mb download and upload respectively, again downtime was probably about 1 day a year. There was a period of about 3 months that I could not update the TV listings for my Plex/HDhomerun media system, but switching to 4G only and updating the guide worked until the issue was resolved.

I have upgraded again to the Zyxel NR5103E and now get (over the last week)... 840mb/40mb (this does fluctuate through the day as others utilise the mast, but i still hit above 200mb). 

I am an IT lecturer and have spent this week in online conferences from 9-5 with minimal hiccups.
This is though subject to the quality you might have with your own connection (i have had relatives connect at only 5mb - but they did confirm that the signal was bad in their area.

good luck

[roberto_puch]

My experience was bad. They sell me broadband services. However the tower was busy and there was no enough bandwidth to have video calls. Since I work from home, this is a necessary tool for me. I contacted three and they told me that the towers were very busy. I asked them to cancel the service. They refuse to cancel. I was in the first months of a new contract. They say that because it was "working" they could only offer me half price. I accepted this because  it was cheaper than the full price. I needed to have another broadband provider so I can work. Later they started to charge me full price. I call them and they told me that now the service was better, however, it was too late for me, I had another service already. So, I have to pay the full contract. Daylight robbery!! I have moved all my numbers to another provider.

[JosephK]

Late response, hopefully of use to anyone finding this in future.

Technically worked for us, but we couldn't get 4G+, only 4G, which was too slow for us due to local geography, so we returned the device in the cooling off period.

That was 4 months ago and we're still being billed despite many attempts to get the account closed.  A complaint was raised and accepted, but we still are being billed.  I can't recommend this service.  The internal process for customer support seems completely broken.  I've wasted hours of time on this - feels like it could go on for ever.

[JosephK]

Thought I'd update this, just to "add colour"...

I've since made another complaint (no response on that) and had a nice chat session with someone who assured me my account would be cancelled, again.

In the 10 days since, I've had one SMS threatening me with an "impact" on my credit file, and another with the amount "owing" by me increased...

[JonathanB]

Hi @JosephK,

I'm really sorry to hear that you've still been receiving these messages after requesting to cancel the account. I'll send you a PM to get you in touch with some colleagues who will take ownership of your complaint and make sure this is sorted out.

To view your private messages on the community, click on your avatar image in the top right of any community page, then "Messages".

Thanks,
Jonathan