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Mobile black spots turn office workers off

Manny Pham
May 17, 2017

Almost half (49pc) of office workers experience mobile signal where they currently work, resulting in poor call quality and even drop calls

One in four UK office workers would consider leaving their jobs, or have done, due to lack of mobile coverage in the office.

This is according to research from communications infrastructure provider Arqiva. The research was conducted on 1,000 UK office workers between March and April 2017.

Almost half (49pc) experienced poor mobile signal where they currently work, resulting in poor call quality and even drop calls. Of this percentage, 72 per cent say this is a weekly occurrence, while 25 per cent say it’s daily.

Tactics

The most popular method by office workers to get better signal, is to simply go outside (45pc), standing next to a window is second (39pc), one in three (30pc) stake out the well-known coverage spot.

Over a quarter (28pc) restart devices and 16 per cent simply lift their devices higher.

Blame game

The majority of respondents (90pc) believe the responsibility of better mobile signal falls on the shoulders of the operators. Responsibility was also distributed to devices (70pc), the IT manager (42 per cent) and building design (41 per cent).

According to Arqiva head of products for telecoms John Lillistone the blame is usually on “the building itself” because of modern building materials, such as insulation and double glazing which “can hamper signal.”

“Indoor coverage is clearly not an issue that companies can afford to ignore. Given all this, it is little wonder there is so much confusion among users – indoor mobile coverage is a complicated issue which no one party can solve on its own.

“Networks, architects, builders and employers all have a part to play and as the UK battles to become a leader of the 5G connected world, it is vital for them all to work together to understand their role in finding a solution for current indoor coverage woes,” Lillistone added.

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