Poor cellular connection in Waterdown, Ontario

[W3nd9]

I'm having a lot of trouble lately with calls in the Waterdown, ON area. Calls are failing, choppy or dropping midway through a conversation. I can't get through to a support person and the Chatbot is not helpful. We have 6 accounts with Public Mobile and will need to cancel if we can't make or receive any calls. Hoping this can be resolved and that the company is aware of the problem and working on it. 

The support portal needs some work too. The link to submit a ticket goes to a page that does not exist. All you get is an "Oops...." message and no ability to contact support. 

[Kristowhy]

@W3nd9 does your phone display LTE at the top of screen when a call is in progress?  What does it show?

Also take a look at this VoLTE thread started by @softech 

https://productioncommunity.publicmobile.ca/t5/Get-Support/VoLTE-Phone-Compatibility-Community-membe...

Also see if this call quality still happens in different area.

[computergeek541]

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@W3nd9 wrote:

I will monitor the connection on the devices. To date, I have not, and have just switched to my Cogeco landline, however, this is not a viable long term solution. 

The devices we're using are all iPhones; 8, 11 and 14's. On my 14, I do not have an option for VoLTE. I have yet to check the others. 

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The HSPA network has been and will continue to get worse over time.  As the the HSPA network becomes of even less importance, fewer resources will likely be used to maintain it.

[W3nd9]

I will monitor the connection on the devices. To date, I have not, and have just switched to my Cogeco landline, however, this is not a viable long term solution. 

The devices we're using are all iPhones; 8, 11 and 14's. On my 14, I do not have an option for VoLTE. I have yet to check the others. 

[Kristowhy]

@W3nd9 sounds like you have many different devices and accounts on PM which have been working fine until now and call issues are across the board with these 6 PM activated devices?

When you make a call, does the phone switch to 3G or H or does it show LTE and/or VoLTE indicators at the top.  Check this across your many devices and report back.

Devices that switch to 3G/H either do not have VoLTE activated on the account or the device is not supported for VoLTE and thus using the "legacy" 3G HSPA network for calls.

If your phones are indeed using the legacy 3G HSPA network for calls and you are all having issues now then something has happened with the network.  Hopefully this is not an example of 3G spectrum being re-allocated.

@W3nd9 also, can you give us an idea of what device models these 6 are?

[will13am]

@W3nd9 , Telus does not have towers in your area, they share Bell towers.  Based on this cell tower map, the town does not have that many local towers.  I would have my doubts that major tower changes in recent times have anything to do will calling performance.  I think it has to do with VoLTE rollout related problems which I believe is still around here and there.  Try rebooting the phone.  Try also switching to 3G in the preferred network setting and see if that improves the calling performance.  

https://www.ertyu.org/steven_nikkel/cancellsites.html?lat=43.350758&lng=-79.923306&zoom=12&type=Road...

[softech]

@W3nd9   what phone do you have? 

the VoLTE option could be there, enabled but just hidden (iPhone or Pixel) or not there because your profile is not VoLTE enabled at all. 

[W3nd9]

Thanks so much for your reply. I don't have VoLTE option, but will try LTE and see if that makes a difference. Are you aware of any changes with Public Mobile and Telus? I am wondering if they've switched to Telus towers, which would make sense as we don't have any of those in my area. 

[Dunkman]

@W3nd9 

Was your voice working better before?  

Public mobile has been switching customers to VoLTE the last several months, so this has been affecting some customers' voice calling.  Maybe try to enable VoLTE if you have compatible phones. 

Here is some more information:

https://www.publicmobile.ca/en/on/get-help/articles/volte

You can also check the nearest cell tower to your areas:

https://www.ertyu.org/steven_nikkel/cancellsites.html

Seems like fewer Telus towers in that area, but several Bell towers though.  

You can also try to manually selectd 3G network to see whether that works better for Voice calling.