My Three Experience

[flashforward]

So, here's my honest and truthful experience with Three. The set up: a Three customer forever. Moved into a new apartment three years ago, which has slow fixed line broadband and no full fibre. Chose Three for Home Broadband due to the 5G coverage. For three years, I've had daily, consistent speeds of 500mb - amazing!

That all changed on 29.01.2026. 5G vanished! Not just on Home Broadband, but all my devices (several mobiles contracts on Three included). 4G connection only and speeds dipped to hardly anything. Not sure if it was just a. fluke, but the Three website reassuringly confirmed a fault. Within two days, 5G was back and everything was back to normal...

...until the night of 04.02.2026. 5G vanishes again and 4G speeds drop to less than 1mb. Everything we have relies on Three Home broadband - the service is now unusable.

Reported the issue to Three on 05.02.2026. Spent an hour going through the usual basic troubleshooting until I was eventually informed a fault had been identified and to allow 7 days. No network issues reported on the website.

Two days later, I get a text to say the issue has been resolved. Get home from work, restart all my devices - fault still present.

To cut a long story short, I spent more than 7 days speaking to Three every single day. Repeating myself issue each time and going through the troubleshooting. During this period, I was given misleading information - a fault had been raised / a fault hadn't been raised / the issue was with all my devices losing 5G (oh come on!) Bear in mind my partner who also has multiple Three contracts spent equally as much time on the phone. We were literally banging our heads against a wall! 

We both sent complaints to Three via their web form - more than a week ago with still no acknowledgement.

So, three weeks after the initial fault, we still have no 5G, 4G speeds less than 1mb and constant calls dropping.

How can we have 500mb for three years solid, then this? Why should I have to contact Three every single day to have to repeat myself? Why, when I asked to end my contracts without penalty, was I told I can't?

I am at a loss. Yes, things really have been this bad, and yes, Three customer service is an absolute joke!

Can I also mention Three's Complaint's policy? Each time I complain via live chat, I am asked by the adviser if they can close the complaint. I tell them 'no' because the issue is unresolved, but they inform me they are going to close it anyway - lovely 100% stats closure rate for Three there! 

Can anyone help? (CF64 1**)

[flashforward]

So, around 20:00 this evening, 5G has reappeared across all devices in the local area. Speeds back to an average of 500mb and has been stable for around 45 minutes. Truly hoping the issue that Three states was fixed weeks ago is finally fixed after almost 6 weeks. Interestingly, the Vodafone Network checker seems to have been spot on monitoring the issue and showed a fault at the exact mast where I live - whilst Three denied all knowledge. I am guessing this is down to the merger/mast sharing in place.

[engineer_X]

same here in Margate, its been so slow now as to be unuseable. seams that both EE and 3 share thew same mast here and equipment. BOTH EE and 3 are putting out under 1.7 MB on 5G. being as iam an engineer I have edited the connection. i have amazing connection strength. I have now dropped it to 4G and dubbled my download speed to 3.1MB. so yes they have throttled the entire 5G network . I belive this has something to do with them being bought by Vodaphone (51% owners now) .. Its complete S%^&& if you ask me.

[PeteG]

Hello there. 

It's disappointing to hear you're having issues with the network there. 

It sounds like whatever is causing the issue is more complex than the team anticipated, since it's taking longer to resolve than would be expected. 

Leaving the contract isn't an option that would normally be given in the beginning since the goal would be to fix what's causing the problem first. That option could be looked at in cases where the team can see that an issue might never be fixed, for example if a local site was closed, or if the team can see that the issue will take a long time to fix. 

Generally the option would only be considered after 28 days. The team should be able to verify your issue though, and if that's the case you should be able to have some of the line rental discounted for the time you haven't been able to use it. 

Pete.

[flashforward]

Hi Pete,

I appreciate you getting back to me. I today requested a Deadlock letter from Three and have logged a complaint with the Ombudsman.

If Customer Service had been consistent, I could have accepted there's an issue and waited patiently. However, I have completely lost faith. Having to repeat my issue every single time I contact Three and go through an hour of troubleshooting each time became too much. I have spent no less 12hrs trying to sort this - or at least get an answer I trust. If someone had taken ownership in the beginning, this matter need not have gone this far. Unfortunately, this is the world we live in - no one cares.

I refuse to deal with their incompetent Customer Service team regarding this issue any further.