Vodafone Idea suffers network outage, trends on Twitter

Vodafone Idea's (Vi) service was disrupted in parts of Maharashtra after a key site in Pune went down due to heavy rains. Irate customers posted complaints on social media platforms, which led to the telco trending on Twitter on Thursday.
“Heavy rain in Pune resulted in flooding of some areas including one of our key sites in the city. This caused partial disruption in services for some customers, earlier today,” Vi said in a statement. “Our technical team has worked non-stop, deployed interim solutions and restored Voice & Data services. We sincerely regret the inconvenience caused to our customers,” it added .

However, subscribers from other regions including Mumbai and Nagpur also complained of poor-quality service. Hashtags #Vodafonedown #vodafoneindia @vodafoneidea were trending on Twitter on Thursday. Subscribers also put up memes to show their angst against the country’s third-largest telco.

The regulator said Vi lost 3.72 million subscribers in July, compared with strong additions for rivals Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio. Analysts said service quality issues and a lower 4G coverage compared to rivals are considered to be the main reasons behind the telco’s steady loss of subscriber and revenue market share.