BlackBerry email goes down again (Update: fixed)

 

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By Stewart Mitchell

Posted on 21 Sep 2012 at 10:47

BlackBerry users across Europe and beyond have been left without email after a problem with the company's servers saw the service crash.

The Research in Motion network failure will bring a sense of déjà vu to customers who were also left without messaging last autumn in an outage that went on for days.

“We are currently experiencing a BlackBerry service issue impacting some users in Europe, Middle East and Africa. All relevant support teams are working to resolve the issue,” RIM said, adding in a conversation with PC Pro that the company didn't believe it was affecting all customers.

With users often blaming their carriers for such problems, Vodafone was quick to distance itself from the issue, telling PC Pro: “This is a BlackBerry problem and is affecting handsets across all carriers.”

RIM was unable to suggest how long the service disruption might continue, but said it would keep users updated via Twitter.

If the company can provide useful up-to-date information, it will show it has learned from the experience last year, when consumers reacted angrily to the lack of updates.

The backlash is one reason the company offered free apps to the value of $100 as an apology, but today's outage couldn't have come at a worse time.

The company is already struggling against the rise of the iPhone and Android handsets, and the network failure on the day of the iPhone 5 launch won't help.

“My blackberry not working this morning has helped make up my mind on an #iphone5,” posted customer Laura Regin on Twitter.

UPDATE, 13:45: BlackBerry has confirmed via Twitter, that the problem has now been fixed.

"Some users experienced issues with BlackBerry services today. Apologies for any inconvenience caused. All services now operating normally."