Mobile operational and engineering enquiries and advice

Ofcom has published advice on its website about masts and planning, describing UK policy for the siting of masts, with links to further information, relevant legislation and sources of advice.

Consumer enquiries should be made via the contact information given on each of the public websites of the UK cellular operators.

Ofcom has published advice on its website about cellular coverage.

Technical and planning enquiries

For the following or similar purposes:

• To report construction, utility or other engineering works that may either affect or require access to a site;
• To report a service outage or loss of coverage in a given area;
• To report damage, noise or alarms at a site;
• To contact an operator regarding site access, ownership or lease issues;
• To request sharing an operator’s site by another communications service;
• Enquiries from local planning authorities.

Enquiries should be made via the contact information given in Annex G of the Code of Best Practice on Mobile Network Development in England, published by the trade association for the UK’s mobile network operators: Mobile UK.

Ofcom regulates the operation of mobile networks in relation to their use of radio frequencies but does not have any duties related to the recommendations for exposure to EMF emissions.  We have published an information page about exposure to electromagnetic fields which provides background information and indicates where further advice may be found.

Ofcom covers a very wide range of topics in the spectrum, telecommunications, broadcasting and postal policy areas.  A great deal of information, advice and FAQs is published on our website.  But if you do not find the information you need, please visit contacting Ofcom or call us on 0300 123 3333 or 020 7981 3040. We are open Monday to Friday from 9.00am to 5.00pm.

The Sitefinder website has now been discontinued.  

We no longer receive data updates from mobile operators on their mast locations. As a result, the Sitefinder data was several years old and could be very misleading. We recommend checking mast locations with your operator. If you’re interested in finding out about mobile coverage, do try our interactive map.

The last update of Sitefinder data was made in May 2012, although some of the source information was supplied earlier.  This dataset includes contributions from:

• Airwave (February 2010)
• Hutchison (February 2012)
• Network Rail (April 2012)
• O2 (May 2012)
• Orange (February 2010)
• T-Mobile (August 2005).
• Vodafone (October 2011)

It therefore does not represent current network deployment.  It is still available to download for reference, although Ofcom does not accept any liability for inaccuracies or omissions in the data.

Between 2001 and 2012, Ofcom and its predecessor, the Radiocommunications Agency (RA), conducted a programme of measurements showing that emission levels around mobile phone base stations were consistently found to be only a very small fraction of the safety levels for exposure published by Public Health England.

Results of measurements taken  between 2001 and 2014 are available at site surveys.  Information including how to request a site survey is  published in the information sheet OFW80.