Singtel customers hit by 6-hour mobile service outage on Nov 18

SINGAPORE – Singtel customers experienced a service outage lasting more than six hours on Nov 18, with over 1,600 reports at its peak in the afternoon.

The outage numbers were recorded on Downdetector, which tracks outages by collating status reports from a number of sources.

Reports of a service outage started at about 3pm with 16 logged, climbing to 1,682 reports at 4.46pm. At 5.16pm, the number dropped to 753 reports, but climbed back up to 1,343 at 5.46pm.

In a response to a query from The Straits Times, a Singtel spokesperson said: “We are aware that some customers experienced momentary intermittent mobile connectivity. Customers are advised to power their devices off and on to resume connectivity. We apologise for the inconvenience caused.”

In an update on Facebook at 7.05pm, the telco said that its engineers were working to restore service, with connectivity returning progressively.

In a subsequent update on Facebook at 10.07pm, Singtel said that mobile connectivity had been restored and that services were operating normally.

On a post on social media platform Reddit at 5.46pm, user banedacasual, who had to use Wi-Fi provided by coffee chain Starbucks, reported that mobile data and text services had stopped working.

“(Maximum) I could manage was one bar for about 10 seconds before no signal at all,” said banedacasual.

Other users responded, stating that they were experiencing intermittent and inconsistent data connections. Some also reported that they were unable to make or receive calls.

On Oct 8, 2024,

an unprecedented islandwide disruption

involving Singtel’s telecommunications network saw hotlines of the Singapore Civil Defence Force and police, as well as those of hospitals and banks, rendered unreachable.

The disruption lasted for more than three hours before services progressively resumed between 6pm and 7pm.