No broadband or phone signal? Your guide to service outages and compensation

It’s not an exaggeration to say that broadband and mobile phone services are now considered to be essential.

From shopping to socialising, telecommunications services play a huge role in our lives. Increasingly, this is going to become even more important, with the switch off of the analogue phone signal in 2027 leading to our home phone lines becoming digital services.

So, when your phone service fails or your broadband cuts out, it can have a huge impact.

In this guide, we will explain what to do if you are experiencing poor service from a broadband or mobile phone company or the service cuts out completely.

It’s not always easy to tell if there is a problem with a telecommunications service on a local, regional or national level – or if the problem is specific to your service. In addition, both your phone or your router and the telecommunications infrastructure can also result in little to no service.

Start with a little bit of troubleshooting:

Broadband

If your broadband doesn’t seem to be working, check the connections to your router and wall socket, along with your television and other internet-connected items in your home.

If you have a smart television, then you’ll usually be able to run some diagnostic tests on it that should give you an indication if there’s a problem. With poor service, rather than a service outage, your router may not give an obvious indication there’s a problem, though flashing red or orange lights are a clear clue something has gone wrong.

Check your broadband provider’s app or website on your phone. This will usually say if there’s a problem in your area. If there doesn’t seem to be an issue, your provider will usually give you some tips to restart your system, from restarting your router to running speed tests. You can also check other free websites that monitor reports of system outages.

Mobile phone

It’s a similar process for a mobile phone issue. If you have no signal (bars on your phone) then use wi-fi to check your service provider’s website or app. Some websites allow you to check reports of problems in your local area by searching your postcode.

Next, try rebooting your phone. Mobile phones are basically mini-computers and are prone to glitches. Follow the restart guidance from your phone provider. Be cautious about ‘restoring factory settings’ as you could lose your data.

If you’re experiencing a problem specific to your landline or broadband, the service provider will send an engineer to resolve the problem if they can’t do this remotely. You may wish to use free speed and connectivity apps to record poor/no service, which can be helpful if you want to pursue a complaint.

However, if there’s a wider issue, it’s a case of waiting for the problem to be fixed. Make a note of when you first encountered the problem and take screenshots that show the service isn’t working.

Telecommunications regulator, Ofcom, has an automatic compensation scheme that means you should receive payouts if things go wrong with your broadband service. There isn’t currently a compensation scheme for service outages with mobile phones, though you may be able to ask for compensation to reflect the impact on you.

The broadband compensation scheme is ‘opt in’ – but it’s considered to be good business practice - with all the main providers participating. You can find a full list here.

Here’s what you can expect in terms of automatic compensation*:

• Missed appointments: if the engineer doesn’t turn up or the appointment is cancelled with less than 24 hours’ notice: £32.31 per appointment.

• Delays with starting the new service: £6.46 for each day after the missed start date.

• If the service is not fixed two working days after you report it, you’ll receive £10.34 for each full day it is still not fixed after that.

*These figures were as of April 2026. Ofcom may have updated information at https://www.ofcom.org.uk/phones-and-broadband/service-quality/automatic-compensation-need-know

These payments should increase annually in line with inflation, which is handy as your bill will go up at the same time – April 1st – in most cases.

Compensation should be paid no later than 30 days after the incident and will be paid as a credit on your bill, though you can ask for an alternative method.

If you don’t receive the compensation, then make a complaint to your service provider. If you remain unhappy, or your complaint hasn’t been resolved in 8 weeks (which will reduce to 6 weeks from April 8, 2026), then you can raise a dispute to your provider’s ADR service. Communications Ombudsman deals with disputes for over 1200 providers – search for your provider here.