'Vital' calls missed due to month-long signal work

O2 said disruption in County Durham was taking longer to fix than anticipated due to "unforeseen technical issues"

Villagers whose phone signal has been disrupted for a month said they are missing "vital" texts and calls.

Some residents of Esh Winning, County Durham, have had little or no signal since 13 January and said hospital appointment messages were being missed and elderly residents were "facing hardship" without landlines.

Operator O2, which is used by Tesco Mobile and Sky, said there had been "unforeseen technical issues" during an upgrade to a mast.

Mother-of-three Joanne Kelly said she had missed Universal Credit appointment texts and the disruption was causing "stress and anxiety".

Residents said the issues were supposed to be resolved by 8 February according to O2's network status checker.

Miss Kelly, who is with Sky, said: "The fact that the kids' schools have no way of contacting me in case of an emergency is ridiculous."

'Absolutely fuming'

Vodafone, which is used by Asda Mobile and Talkmobile, has also been affected.

Resident Ann Coult said she had been unable to use online banking and had to travel to a branch in Durham to pay bills.

She also said Vodafone had offered her an £18 refund on her bill.

"I filled in a form online and l got a message saying they had tried to call me," Ms Coult said.

"I was absolutely fuming as I don't understand why they tried to call when I told them I had no service."

Another resident, who did not wish to be named, said: "It is causing a lot of hardship for folk with children in school or nursery needing service in case of emergencies, and also for elderly people with no landline."

Residents in the village said they had been unable to receive of make calls for four weeks

An O2 spokesperson said customers wishing to discuss compensation should get in touch with its care team.

"We are carrying out planned upgrades to a mast," the spokesperson said.

"Due to unforeseen technical issues this work is taking longer than anticipated to complete and we apologise for any inconvenience caused."

Vodafone apologised for the disruption and urged customers to sign up to the network checker.

"Our infrastructure partner, who is responsible for the mast, is aware of the network issues and we're working hard with them to restore services as soon as possible," a spokesman said.