Virgin Media Community

[Madscot]

My son is currently at Leeds festival and text me to say his data isn't worked and he has a message saying 'operator turned off data'

I've checked account and he still has over 80gb of data remaining. Do you think this could be just a blip and maybe a congestion issue with the amount of people around? 

[jb66]

It's normal in highly congested areas like big football matches and festivals to loose data or have extremely slow data

[Corey_C]

Thanks for your post and welcome to the Community Forums, Madscot,

Sorry to hear that your son has not been able to use his data. We would not have turned it off unless billing related. We'd be happy to check his service if you like, but if he has available mobile data allowance then it should be working. 

@jb66 is correct that congestion can be a possibility when large groups gather.

Cheers,

Corey C

[enlli]

Just to say I have come back from a big festival. Hardly any usable data on all networks, but I was expecting that as it's par for the course.

[Corey_C]

Hope you had a great time at the festival, at least @enlli! 

Let us know if your son is OK now @Madscot

Cheers,

Corey C

[Madscot]

Thank you for everyone's replies. All good now and he is back from festival (a bit worse for wear) and normal service resumed. I hadn't realised large crowds causes such issues with phones. 

[enlli]

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@Madscot wrote:

Thank you for everyone's replies. All good now and he is back from festival (a bit worse for wear) and normal service resumed. I hadn't realised large crowds causes such issues with phones. 

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Cell towers can only handle a finite number of connections at one time. In cities cell locations are near together and a phone can often see 2 or 3.

Most festivalsare in fields outside of built up areas so there are less cell towers in the first place. A sudden increase in the population by a magnitude of hundreds in some cases and all wanting to use their phones the system is swamped.

We communicated by text at the last one. Text messages often get through when nothing else does.

[Madscot]

Thanks for that. Quite a few of my text messages didn't reach and I just thought he was ignoring me but now I know.