Roger’s users were dealing with a mass outage across Canada Friday, impacting most internet, phone, Interac and other various services nationally.
Customers were left in the dark for hours as the company didn’t acknowledge the issue until 9 a.m.
“We know how important it is for our customers to stay connected,” the RogersHelps Twitter account wrote in it’s initial post.
“We are aware of issues currently affecting our networks and our teams are fully engaged to resolve the issue as soon as possible. We will continue to keep you updated as we have more information to share.”
No updates have since been provided relating to the cause of the outage or when services will be back up and running.
Until that time comes, here is a list of impacted services in the London, Ont., area:
City of London
According to a post on Twitter, “those contacting the City of London may receive a delayed responses.”
London Police Service
London police issued a statement to Twitter explaining that while their 9-1-1 lines are operational, they are advising the public to not test their cell and internet services by calling their emergency line.
“This ties up our system for individuals who are in need of emergency assistance,” police said on Twitter.
Hospitals
According to a spokesperson from the London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC), systems within the hospital seem to be unaffected with no changes to patient appointments, including surgeries.
“Virtual care appointments are still available. For patients who are unable to connect, our health care teams will be in touch to rebook your appointment,” wrote Steve Young, media relations consultant for LHSC, in an email to Global News.
“Care partners who are expecting to take a discharged loved one home today should call the hospital to confirm if they are able, as our switchboard remains unaffected.”
St. Joseph’s Health Care also said its systems are unaffected.
Virtual care appointments are still available at both hospitals. For patients who are unable to connect, health care teams will be in touch to rebook appointments.
LondonHydro
London Hydro customers with an online account can still reach out for assistance via the MyLondonHydro online chat feature.
Local businesses and gas stations
As the outage continues to affect interact sales across the country, some local businesses are asking incoming customers to bring cash while Rogers connected debit and credit machines remain down.
Londoners have also taken to Twitter to report that their Uber Eats and Skip the Dishes orders have also been impacted in relation to the outage.
London Public Library
While not affected by the outage, the London Public Library reported an average 1,200 Londoners have been using their public Wifi on Friday.
Anne O’Sullivan, manager of customer services and branch operations for the London Public Library, told 980 CFPL it’s been an “astronomical” day for people accessing their services.
She said, unlike home internet, the library gets service from LARGnet, an internet provider that partners with Rogers, Telus, and Bell, so they don’t lose access when one goes down.
“We were lucky that our IT team was right on the ball this morning, making sure that we had enough capacity because we knew that people working from home, people who have Rogers Internet at home, would need to come here sort of as their home away from home or their office away from home,” O’Sullivan said.
For Londoner Stephanie Berube, the internet outage made for a chaotic start to the day.
“It was just kind of unfolding without any information because then my phone also can’t access anything through there either,” Berube said.
“I wake up very early, so I was up at around 5 a.m. already doing report reports for work, and then it went out halfway through. So I was like, OK, I’ll get a little bit of sleep and come back, and then it just never came back.”
She tells Global News she has been trying to find other ways to keep busy by cleaning and ultimately ended up going to one of the public libraries to get some work done.
“You don’t realize like how much technology impacts you – not being able to take our money or, you know, do your job or get online, communicate with people. It’s just wild,” Berube said.
For more information, check out the Rogers outage map.
With files from Global News’ Sawyer Bogdan
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