Cell C gives free data after network outage

On 1 December, Cell C users in Gauteng, Western Cape and Mpumalanga reported that they had no voice and data service on Down Detector for about two hours.

The outage also affected Cell C’s MVNO networks including FNB Connect and Virgin Mobile.

Tests were performed by Gadget in Pretoria (Fixed Cell C LTE), Johannesburg (Mobile Cell C LTE) and Randburg (Mobile FNB Connect LTE) to confirm that the outage affected these areas.

The cause of the outage was reported by Cell C in a thread on Twitter:

This resulted in the Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) system, that enables the routing of traffic on the network, to overheat and power down. Additional generators have been deployed and the equipment has been restored.

— Cell C (@CellC) December 1, 2018

The mobile network reported that it has taken steps to ensure that a network outage does not happen again by deploying additional generators at the data centre. The network will be providing one gigabyte of data (valid for 5 days) to its customers.

We want to thank our customers for their patience during the unprecedented network outage earlier today. To show our appreciation, we will provide each customer with 1GB of data valid for 5 days. We will notify you of when data will be loaded. Again, our sincere apologies.

— Cell C (@CellC) December 1, 2018