O2 blackout: communication is vital when technology goes wrong Yesterday O2"s Twitter account was deluged with complaints - and the only responses from the company's social media team were continual bland apologies and vague promises that the "unidentified fault" would be fixed "as soon as possible." Meanwhile the company's helplines were jammed - and here's the best bit - O2"s network status web page was intermittently unavailable, as servers struggled to cope with the crush of customers seeking details. Why can't these huge technology-based and communications companies come up with brilliant processes during the other 364 days of the year when their IT systems are behaving, which can cope with the huge and unsurprising demands for information by their customers during times of crisis? Surely it is not too much to expect a phone company, such as O2 or Blackberry, which is in the daily business of connecting people, to be able to communicate effectively with their clients in times of need. Even if it were just through the means of social networks - which essentially provide free systems to all to communicate through - that would be better than nothing. What's more, unlike with Natwest (which has seen many people leaving to put their money elsewhere), people are usually tied into lengthy multi-year contracts with their mobile phone companies - something telecoms companies must be forced to review by Ofcom if glitches keep happening with very poor communication. Moreover, the major failure is O2"s second in two weeks. In June, thousands of customers were left unable to send texts for a whole day - again furnished with very little explanation as to why. At the time of writing, the network, whose slogan is ironically "We're better connected," had still not issued a timetable for a full solution, but now says that its 2G voice network is fixed and that services should fully resume over the course of the day. Crucially O2, RBS and Blackberry need to remain even better connected once the connection cuts out. Their respective businesses depend upon it.