'Crap service': 3G shutdown will leave remote households in the lurch

Ross Shearwood, Narromine resident and owner of Ross Shearwood Radio Communications, said people in remote areas who relied on the 3G network would no longer be able to make calls.

These included people who lived more than 20 kilometres from a mobile phone tower - including in the town of Gin Gin, and south of Narromine and west of Trangie - and were relying on mobile phone boosters to boost their 3G signal.

In these areas, the 4G network didn't reach them and the 5G network was non-existent, he said.

"I think it's going to become a big issue, but the issue is not going to become apparent until they switch the network off," Mr Shearwood told ACM (publisher of The Senior).

In his work, Mr Shearwood installs mobile phone boosters across the central west. He also has extensive experience installing satellite internet with NBN.

"For a lot of those people, they can set their booster to 3G and it worked fine. But when they go over to 4G, the coverage is very poor by comparison," Mr Shearwood said.

"In signal strength it's often a matter of two bars difference between the two ... "

Mr Shearwood said mobile phones these days would automatically switch to a 4G network if they could find one, but in some of these remote areas the 4G service was so weak people couldn't make a phone call.

To further exacerbate the problem, many modern phones - particularly iPhones - didn't allow users to manually switch the network to 3G, so they were stuck on a mobile phone network through which they couldn't make any calls.

"All of a sudden ... 3G won't be available anymore so we will all go to 4G. Those people in more remote areas will find they will have crap signal. That's my concern," he said.

Mr Shearwood has approached the office of Mark Coulton, federal member for Parkes, and hopes someone will hear his concerns and explain whether the telecommunications industry has a workaround planned for people in the country.

Mr Coulton said there were lots of people living in rural areas who were concerned about the 3G shutdown, and were worried the 4G and 5G networks were not as good as 3G.

However, he said he believed much of the concern came from "a lack of understanding into how the mobile network works".

"The 3G network was launched in 2006 to meet the growing desire to be more connected through technology," Mr Coulton said.

"However, over the last 18 years, technology and our mobile devices have come a long way and the 3G network can no longer meet our needs as our reliance on mobile networks grows, as does our need for faster speeds and more data on a secure network.

"Our use of the mobile network for video streaming, online education, and remote healthcare, has rendered the present 3G network obsolete.

"In order to meet the growing demand for data, mobile network operators need to upgrade mobile network technology so that they can offer faster and more reliable mobile services using 4G and 5G networks."

He acknowledged the closure of 3G meant people with older devices or 3G-only phones would no longer be able to make calls, including emergency calls.

"While I acknowledge that this is worrying for many, it may be just a matter of purchasing a new phone or device that operates on 4G or 5G networks," Mr Coulton said.

"Most recent makes and models of phones will be 4G and 5G compatible. It's the phones or devices that are generally over 10 years old that are affected."

He urged people to check their phones and devices to ensure they would still be able to work once 3G is switched off.

"You will need to contact your service provider to check if your device is impacted," he said.