Vodafone's Decline in Profits - What's the Problem?

Vodafone's declined in profits have sprung warnings across other telecommunication networks in the region. What are the possibilities which caused Vodafone's profit to decrease?

While I am not able to discuss about the reasons behind the decrease of Vodafone's profit in other region, I might be able to discuss about the possible reasons which lead to the decrease in Vodafone's profit in the UK. We shall start with Vodafone's customer service.

Traditionally Vodafone's customer service has been their strongest point until recently. I have been a customer of Vodafone for the past ten years but I have not encountered a problem with bad attitude of their customer service until recently. I have no idea the change in the attitude of those lovely people but I feel that some Vodafone customers no longer feel the need to remain loyal to Vodafone.

Apart from a degrading customer service, Vodafone's 3G service should be called to question. I am wondering whether anyone will take note but I think I will give my unbiased review of Vodafone's 3G service in this post.

Initially, Vodafone's 3G service was pretty decent. They have lots of transmission masks around the UK including the countryside. I was getting a good signal using my trusted Nokia E90. I have endless joy using data via 3G on the Nokia E90. Out of the blues, the 3G signal just vanished. I was gobsmacked. I ended up calling customer service many times. However, I have come to a conclusion that they will not be able to help me because they said that my house is situated at the very end of a transmission tower which I beg to differ because I was getting a very good 3G service on my E90 until a few years ago.

The customer service agent then changed her attitude and said that they are working on their 3G signal. She then told me that they are going to release their 4G service and it will be much better than their 3G service.

At this moment, I am stuck on using 2G on my mobile phone but luckily I have wifi at home so it is not that bad. The point is that Vodafone knows that they have signal issues with their 3G service but they could not do anything more to improve the service!

Moreover, their price plan is also quite expensive as compared to other mobile networks eg: T-Mobile and other virtual networks like Tesco Mobile, Virgin Mobile and Giffgaff.

It is time for Vodafone to improve on their 3G signal to regain the crown. I have faith in Vodafone but they need to speed up in their improvements!

Update:

21 December 2013 - I have tried my level best to give Vodafone UK a chance to redeem itself. Recently I have upgraded my only contract with them for a Samsung flagship phone. Suffice to say, I was unhappy with their service. It has come to my attention that there are two types of contract where (a) store or (b) online. If you have upgraded your contract online or via the telephone, you have a better chance of seeking a replacement of the phone as opposed to upgrading your Vodafone contract in the store.

It is just a piece of advice but I will not recommend Vodafone UK anymore because they have absolutely no interest in providing good customer service especially those service assistance in the store. If you really need to stay with Vodafone, I would recommend you to take up a contract online or via the telephone and never ever sign up to a mobile contract in the store. You will regret it.

Vodafone UK does not put customers first. Apart from their poor 3G coverage in the country, their so called 4G coverage remain patchy. O2 UK arguably have the best 4G coverage in the country although EE have more 4G coverage than O2 UK. My analysis is O2 UK have the best 4G coverage in terms of stability and speed. No wonder Vodafone UK is losing customers much faster than other mobile network providers. It does not make sense if Vodafone UK is asking customers to pay £42 a month with 3 months unlimited data service if the customer can only receive 2G data for most of the time. Is this the way how Vodafone UK want to move forward to attract more customers? If that is an affirmation, I pity those Vodafone customers. Even ASDA have decided to ditch Vodafone UK and utilise EE for their prepaid service. I wonder why was the need to switch mobile partner. Perhaps this might provide a glimps of the true reason for the split. So long, Vodafone UK.