The Rogers logo is photographed in Toronto on Monday, September 30, 2019. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Tijana Martin)

By The Canadian Press

NO CALLS

Widespread Rogers outage affects 911 calls, passport offices

Jul 8, 2022 | 8:46 AM

A widespread network outage from Rogers Communications Inc. has left many customers without mobile and internet service Friday morning and is causing problems for police, radio broadcasters and Service Canada passport offices.

A notice on the Toronto-based telecommunications company’s website said the outage is impacting both its wireless and home service customers and is also affecting phone and chat support.

“We are aware of issues currently affecting our networks and our teams are fully engaged to resolve the issue as soon as possible,” Rogers said in a tweet.

Asked what caused the outage, how many customers were impacted and where and when service might return, Rogers spokesperson Chloe Luciani referred The Canadian Press back to the tweet.

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The company promised to share further updates when they become available and said, “We know how important it is for our customers to stay connected.”

On social media, people reported issues with accessing Rogers services at courthouses, coffee shops and airports.

Police in Toronto and Ottawa warned there were even some connection problems when calling 911.

“If your call fails, please try again, or call from a landline or cellphone with another provider,” Ottawa Police said on Twitter.

Service Canada tweeted it too was wrapped up in the outage with call centres and offices, including ones that issue passports, affected.

The outage stands to exacerbate passport delays that have left Canadians lined up outside Service Canada offices for lengthy periods of time as the government works through a backlog.

CBC Radio in Kitchener and Waterloo also reported the outage affected its programming Friday morning.

“The Morning Edition listeners will be hearing Metro Morning today. We will be back with you as soon as possible,” CBC said.

TekSavvy, an independent service provider, said in a tweet that it was being impacted by the outage and having trouble with contact centre phone lines. It noted it has no estimate for when there could be a resolution.

Downdetector, a website that tracks outages, showed people started reporting problems with Rogers’ service around 4:30 a.m. local time and by 7 a.m. 20,000 reports had been logged.

DownDetector.ca

Customers in Toronto, Kitchener, Moncton, Ottawa and Mississauga logged the most reports on the website with 45 per cent saying they were experiencing a total blackout, 29 per cent seeing issues with mobile internet and 26 per cent facing landline internet problems.

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