Why ARE our mobile phone signals so patchy?

As even the PM says he can’t make calls on holiday …

WAnT to know just how terrible Britain’s mobile phone network is? Take a trip to Tanzania. Last year on a research trip to Africa, I stood on a remote hillside hundreds of miles from any sizeable town and phoned home.

Incredible as it seemed, in the middle of nowhere, in one of the poorest countries in the world, my phone was showing five bars of signal. Five bars! Up until that point, having used my phone only in Britain, I didn’t know that was possible.

Yet despite the strong signal, I didn’t manage to speak to my wife. She was camping with our daughter in the new Forest and there was, of course, no signal.

The fact that I was forced to leave a voicemail thanks to Britain’s often hopeless phone system spoke volumes.

Black spots, calls that cut out and half-snatched conversations are daily irritants for millions. The problem was highlighted this week by david Cameron as he revealed that he struggles to stay in touch with world leaders when holidaying in Cornwall.

The coverage is so bad that the most powerful man in Britain has to drive up the nearest hill to make a call.

But it’s not just Cornwall, the Highlands, rural Wales or the far-flung reaches of Lincolnshire where phone calls are impossible. Much of our road network, railways and even parts of our large, crowded cities have no signal.

So how did we get to the state where coverage is still so poor? And can anything be done to force the phone industry to end the black spots?

HOW DID THE PATCHY NETWORK DEVELOP?

THE first British mobile phone call was officially made on new Year’s day 1985 by comedian Ernie Wise, and the first analogue service was updated to a digital network in the mid-nineties.

That second-generation voice and text network began to be replaced in 2003 with a third generation — or 3G — network that could handle the internet, too.

Today, most phones use the 3G network. Work on expanding the latest network — 4G, which promises broadband speed on your mobile — started in earnest last year.

The speed of the mobile revolution was driven by the market — and the realisation that there were huge profits to be made. So operators creating the network of masts went for the easy targets of the densely populated cities first.

Smaller towns and transport l i nks came next, and then finally villages and some of the more populated rural areas.

But not all. With no financial incentive from customers or tough Government regulation, there was little reason to extend the network to remote, sparsely populated parts of the UK.

WHAT MUST PHONE FIRMS PROVIDE?

In 2000, the sales of the newly available 3G licences to operators raised £24.5 billion.

But those licences were given on condition that companies cover 80 per cent of t he population with 3G. That target rose to 90 per cent in 2010.

The companies had until June last year to meet the higher target — and all did apart from Vodafone, which reached it in January.

But while nine out of ten people sounds good on paper, the flaw with the Government targets i s that they cover population, not geography.

out of the 63 million people in the UK, 84 per cent live in England and a third live in the South-East. Thus mobile phone companies can meet their 90 per cent targets while leaving huge regions uncovered.

HOW BAD IS THE PROBLEM?

TALK to the four main mobile phone operators — Vodafone, o2, EE and 3 — and they’ll tell you that coverage is widespread in the UK.

About 99 per cent of the population has 2G coverage at home, while between 90 and 95 per cent have 3G. But figures from the regulator ofcom show t hat 2 3 per c e nt of t he countryside can’t get 3G, while only 20 per cent is covered by all four 3G operators.

About 13 per cent of Britain, including 4 per cent of roads, has no mobile signal at all.

Signal strength is worst in rural areas — in Cornwall, devon, Suffolk, dorset, west, central and north Wales, Cumbria and most of rural Scotland.

And those ofcom figures describe only the strength of a mobile phone signal outdoors. once a signal has tried to barge its way through the bricks, concrete and steel of our homes, reception is even weaker.

WHAT ABOUT CITIES?

YOU might expect signals to be weak in remote mountain tops. But why are there signal failures in the heart of cities?

Black spots aren’t just caused by a lack of masts. Buildings or hills can block the signals from transmitters relatively close by.

That’s why it’s possible for you to get a perfect signal out in the street but struggle at home unless you hang out of the bathroom window.

Equally, the sheer number of people in cities can cause a problem, even if you’ve got three or four bars of signal.

It happens during sports games, or after disasters.

After the 7/7 bombings in London in 2005, the network quickly became overloaded and went down for the millions desperately trying to ring loved ones.

operators were forced to restrict calls to emergency services in the area around the bombings. Mobile phone base stations are able only to cope with a set number of calls at a time. If you regularly find you get a signal but can’t get through, then your operator has failed to invest enough in new masts to keep up with demand.

Another major gripe f or travellers is trying to use their phones on a train.

There are technical reasons why it is harder for phones to connect while zooming through the countryside at 80mph, but mostly it’s down to a lack of investment in trackside masts.

A study published this year showed rail passengers are without a 3G signal 28 per cent of the time, while on motorways, passengers are without a signal for 24 per cent of the time.

WHOSE COVERAGE IS THE WORST?

WHEN it comes to coverage, EE has the most reliable and best- quality coverage, while Vodafone’s is t he worst, according to the independent analysts RootMetrics.

But your experience of your mobile phone company will vary hugely according to where you live, work and travel.

The company 3 may do well in RootMetrics’ tests of 3G coverage. But if you live in a 3 black-spot in Winchester, you may find it less impressive.

The differences between providers are l i kely to get smaller over time with the advent of 4G. Vodafone and o2 are working together on the creation of 4G masts, which should improve coverage.

The signals should travel further and so could reach rural areas where you can’t get 3G.

Vodafone and o2 claim they will offer 4G to 98 per cent of the population by the end of 2014. EE says it can do that by the end of this year.

WHAT CAN BE DONE?

THE Government says it is investing £150 million in 500 new phone masts in rural black spots where there is no coverage.

The latest plan, announced last week, is to force companies to allow ‘national roaming’. So if coverage with one network drops, y our phone wil l automatically seek out a rival.

Roaming is proven to work when abroad. But the operators say it will discourage investment in masts. Why build a mast up Snowdonia if your rivals will be able to use it?

There are technical problems, too, in ensuring calls don’t cut off when your phone goes from one company to another. And working out billing and data limits could be a nightmare.

SO HOW CAN YOU IMPROVE IT?

IF YOU have patchy coverage in your home, you can get two types of boosters.

Some plug into your internet router and act like a mini mast with a range of about 15 metres. others connect to the internet and smartphones using your home’s Wi-Fi network.

Bill Moore , CEO of RootMetrics, says some phones — such as Samsung Galaxy and HTC models — are better at picking up weak signals.

‘There are differences between handsets, even when the hardware looks the same, and it will affect your coverage,’ he says.

Moving closer to a window also helps. Phone signals struggle with brick walls, but don’t object so much to glass.

But ultimately, until the provision of a truly national mobile phone network is treated with the same seriousness as the national Grid, your best bet may be to move to Tanzania.