EE 3G network goes down just days after 4G launch

'We don't know what the exact issue is,' admits Orange technical support

Everything Everywhere's 3G network is experiencing a complete outage across the UK, with Orange's technical support unable to shed any light on the exact nature of the problem.

Reports from EE service users of slow or disrupted service have been appearing since the company, which incorporates Orange and T-Mobile mobile providers, rolled out its 4G mobile internet service on Tuesday.

Computing contacted Orange customer support, which confirmed that "there is an issue across the board. It happened about half an hour to 45 minutes ago."

The call was placed at 11.15am this morning, after outages had already been reported for at least two hours by users on Twitter.

The representative also spoke about the breadth of the outage, stating, "As far as I know it's Orange and T-Mobile," implicating the entire UK EE network.

"We don't know what the exact issue is," added the Orange representative. "We've just been advised that customers are not able to access the internet on our network."

When asked when service is likely to be resumed, the representative replied: "Our engineers are trying to fix this issue as we speak, but we don't know the complexity of the issue at the moment, so I wouldn‘t like to give you a timescale. All I can say is it's going to be up and running ASAP."

When pressed, the representative said that Orange hoped to have 3G "up and running in a couple of hours, if not sooner."

EE's press office has seen been back in touch with Computing, attaching a statement that EE wishes to specify is from an Orange spokesperson. The statement reads, "We can confirm that a small number of Orange customers were affected by a network issue for a short period of time this morning and we apologise for any inconvenience caused."

"Calls and texts were unaffected. Some customers could not access 2G and 3G data but this was fully restored by 12pm," the statement continued.