SIMs for East Coast cruising ?

pragmatist

pragmatist

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Just read an interesting thread on the topic covering Western Scotland EE SIM for the West of Scotland. We are hoping, Covid permitting, to return to old haunts on the East Coast with our new-to-us catamaran. Having 4G is very important to us so I wondered if East Coast sailors could advise on coverage. Currently we have EE and are proposing to put a 4G antenna on the old wind generator pole.

Do you get decent 4G ? Who with ? Where ? Anchorages of particular interest as we hope not to use marinas too often. Area we are looking at is Swale/Medway as far as Walton Backwaters/Harwich and maybe a little beyond.

TIA

Penny
 
Hi Penny
We have internet onboard through Vodafone and have recieved good access in the ramsgate, swale, medway, blackwater, orwell, crouch. On the Vodafone site there is a checker you can use by putting in the postcode of where you plan to use your WIFI and will tell you what sort of connection is available.
 
All those places have perfect EE coverage, plenty of internet speed using my mobile phone as a hotspot. Apart from Walton Backwaters which I haven't tried.
 
I use a giffgaff SIM, which runs on the O2 network. No problems around the east and south coasts. The online signal checkers mentioned earlier are notoriously optimistic, so I wouldn't bother looking at them.
 
pvb said:
I use a giffgaff SIM, which runs on the O2 network. No problems around the east and south coasts. The online signal checkers mentioned earlier are notoriously optimistic, so I wouldn't bother looking at them.
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In my experience, notoriously optimistic was not the case. When I was looking into WIFI I spoke with one of the well known companies in their store and was asked where I would be using the WIFI. Having checked their website the staff in store actually refused to sell me a SIM on the basis that the majority of use would be in an area of poor coverage. Can't beat that for service and honesty. I would just say do your research and ask people on this site about thier experiences.
 
alandalus11 said:
In my experience, notoriously optimistic was not the case. When I was looking into WIFI I spoke with one of the well known companies in their store and was asked where I would be using the WIFI. Having checked their website the staff in store actually refused to sell me a SIM on the basis that the majority of use would be in an area of poor coverage. Can't beat that for service and honesty. I would just say do your research and ask people on this site about thier experiences.
Click to expand...

I did my research some years ago before I took out a contract with Orange. I was assured that signal strength in my home area was excellent. It wasn't - I could only get a signal at home by hanging out of my bedroom window.
 
Up to the end of 2019 I found good coverage pretty well everywhere on the E Coast with EE. Not been anywhere since then...........:cry:
 
Orange's broadband service was rebranded as EE Broadband on 30 October 2012. So your research would have been a long time ago. With regulation as it is now things have probably changed quite a bit hence me being told I couldn't purchase the SIM from the company I spoke with. As I said, all you can do is research and ask others for their experiences and recommendations.
 
pvb said:
I did my research some years ago before I took out a contract with Orange. I was assured that signal strength in my home area was excellent. It wasn't - I could only get a signal at home by hanging out of my bedroom window.
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There's a huge impact on mobile signal by very local (as in within the 50m in and around your house) environmental conditions.(Trees, power lines, etc...
 
alandalus11 said:
Orange's broadband service was rebranded as EE Broadband on 30 October 2012. So your research would have been a long time ago.
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I think this thread is about mobile phones, not broadband.

EE continued to market Orange phone contracts to new customers until 2015, and to existing customers until 2019.
 
My apologies. As the OP mentioned 4G I thought she was referring to broadband as generrally I associate 4 G with internet speeds and access.
 
I am an O2 user living at St lawrence which is where Stone sailing club is on the River Blackwater.
O2 on the Dengie is a joke One would be better off with 2 coke tins & a piece of string.
If i want to use my phone without using it via my boost box on the internet, I have to go to the waterside & try to get a signal from the tower on the north side of the river. So there is a signal of sorts in the river. It is intermittent in Bradwell marina. Sailing out of the river I can get a good signal from the power station & offshore as far as the Knoll buoy. If running up the North side of the Gunfleet sands I lose the signal well before I get opposite the Gunfleet old light House. . Turning back towards Fellixtowe I can pick up a signal when nearer Clacton After that the phone gets turned off
No signal round the Barrow or the Sunk that I can recall
However, I do ring home when arriving anywhere & it works OK all over the Orwell to Ipswich from the estuary. Also from Lowetoft
 
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Thank you all for your input. Personal experience is usually best - we too have been caught out by the coverage maps optimism. Sounds really good to hear that there does seem to be a lot of coverage - certainly more so than a lot of the West Country where it is exceedingly patchy. We only moved from one mooring on the Dart to another about 200 metres away to find that Three no longer worked !

And yes I was primarily asking about 4G as we really do need the Internet often - but not generally on passage. Phone signal is also useful but family tend to use WhatsApp rather than phone so phone is generally for outgoing calls e.g. chandlers for spares etc !

Do keep your experiences coming. TIA Penny
 
yes......4G is for broadband/internet .....you don't need it for phone calls. "Three" when I signed up offered to cancel the contract
if it didn't work because the checker was saying no in my area (Pinmill) ........ its fine.

I struggle at Orford with O2, very poor.
 
Hi,

EE was formed by a merger of T-mobile and Orange, each of which had a national coverage of masts. Obviously they rationalised the combined network but this was done in a way that only left gaps in coverage where neither of the previous networks worked. It seems to me that this has left them ahead of other networks on UK coverage in general. However, therewill, inevitably be places that EE has a gap and some other network works fine.

Peter.
 
PeterWright said:
EE was formed by a merger of T-mobile and Orange, each of which had a national coverage of masts. Obviously they rationalised the combined network but this was done in a way that only left gaps in coverage where neither of the previous networks worked. It seems to me that this has left them ahead of other networks on UK coverage in general. However, therewill, inevitably be places that EE has a gap and some other network works fine.
Click to expand...

Which reminds me. Those with long memories may recall that T-mobile was originally named One2One - and cruelly nicknamed "One2NoOne" because of its lousy signal coverage!
 
I have EE and have to log on to my firm's cloud system via hotspot on Iphone.
Never had a problem and, at most, I stick the phone out a porthole onto the deck. I find it very fast and better than locally available wifi.
When moving, I sometimes wish the coverage wasn't so good !
 
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