'Lack of phone signal is all anyone talks about'

"Unforeseen technical issues" have been causing continuing mobile phone service issues in some rural areas of County Tyrone for almost a month. Local representatives say it has mostly been affecting Mid Ulster's Torrent electoral district in areas such as Coalisland and Clonoe. Members of the community say that areas, which already had poor reception, were in some cases, "complete blackspots with no signal". The problems have been linked to planned upgrade works on a service site that is hosted by O2, but is also used by a number of other mobile phone companies. O2 said the upgrade works in the area were to ensure "fast and reliable connectivity to customers". An O2 spokesperson said, due to "unforeseen technical issues" the work had taken longer than planned. In a statement on its website on Friday evening O2 said it had "completed some improvement work" in the area and that it would continue to "keep a close eye on the network to make sure everything's working as it should". SDLP councillor Malachy Quinn lives in the Washingbay area of County Tyrone. On Friday night he said that while he welcomed confirmation of improvement works, he still had reports of network problems in the area. He said: "It is clear from speaking to residents across my area that many people - particularly those living in more rural and isolated areas - are still experiencing persistent problems with poor or unreliable mobile signal. "In 2025, it should not be too much to ask for people to have consistent access to calls and data, no matter where they live." It is understood the issues were first reported at the end of May. It was raised at a meeting of Mid Ulster District Council last month by independent councillor Dan Kerr. He called for a meeting with the different major mobile networks. During the meeting council chief executive, Adrian McCreesh, stated: "I've [heard] from a number of members around this chamber in recent days about the behaviour of some of our companies, and the lack of ability for people to get connected." Mr McCreesh confirmed he would be organising a meeting with some of the mobile phone companies operating in the areas of Mid Ulster that had continuous reports of poor signal. Brian Kerr owns a barber shop in the Clonoe Village Business Park. He said: "It's all the customers who come into the shop this past while have been talking about, the fact that the phone signal has somehow managed to get worse, and it was already poor. "At my own house, you have to leave the house and go to the top of the driveway to get any signal at all and even then it's patchy." He added: "Something needs to be done about it long-term, because it's affecting a lot of people, not only socially, but they rely on decent phone signal for their businesses as well." Linda Dillon is a Sinn Fein MLA who lives in the Clonoe area and is calling for the issue to be resolved. She said: "Signal problems have lasted a month, and it's caused problems with parents looking to contact their children when they're out and things like that. "A big part of the problem is trying to get information from the phone companies, the communication to the people on the ground and elected representatives has been very poor, which is bad from communication companies." She added: "Unfortunately there are places in this area, like Derrylaughan, that always have had poor signal, but this time it has been more widespread. "At the end of the day it is an equality issue, rural areas should have access to phone signal the same as people living in urban areas." In 2021, three mobile phone networks agreed a deal tobuild and share masts to improve 4G in rural parts of Northern Ireland. The project was part of the UK government's £1bn Shared Rural Network (SRN) programme, external, aimed at improving rural internet access. The issue of phone signal has been in the news recently followinga series of arson attacks on 5G masts in west Belfast. During a recent debate in the Northern Ireland Assembly about the attacks, DUP MLA Deborah Erskine condemned the incidents but also pointed to the phone signal issues that impact rural communities all year round. Speaking in the assembly, the Fermanagh and South Tyrone MLA said: "I would love to have 4G in my area, never mind 5G, and to see improvements made to masts and infrastructure. "Such improvements are needed, not just in west Belfast, but throughout Northern Ireland." In a statement about the connectivity issues in County Tyrone, O2 said: "While these upgrades will lead to improvements in the longer term, we apologise to customers who may have experienced intermittent service issues whilst the works are completed." Meanwhile, a spokesperson for Vodafone said: "We're sorry to our customers who are affected by issues with their services. "Our infrastructure partner is aware of the network issues due to planned work on a mast in the area and is working hard to restore services."