Three UK, O2 and Vodafone Confirm Plan for Reopening Shops

Mobile operators Three UK and Vodafone have revealed that they will start re-opening their high street stores on 15th June 2020, albeit with new social distancing measures to help protect both staff and customers alike. The move comes after EE (BT) confirmed (here) that all of their stores would also reopen on the same date.

The approaches being taken here are, however, slightly different. At Vodafone the plan is to initially re-open just 65 of their retail stores, and if all goes well, they’ll then open around 300 more a week later. “At this early stage, we’ll be keeping some of our stores in inner London closed because they are in locations that most of our retail colleagues would need to take public transport to get to. We don’t want them to do this at the moment,” said the operator.

Meanwhile Three UK intends to re-open 250 of their stores across England on 15th, albeit operating with reduced hours from 10:00am to 4:00pm. The operator’s other stores in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland will “reopen in due course, pending government guidance.”

At the time of writing O2 has yet to issue a specific announcement, although their general COVID-19 page says, “Stores across England are confirmed to reopen on 15th June with O2 stores across Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales due to reopen pending further guidance.”

Anybody who has recently tried to visit their high street bank or local groceries store knows that the immediate future will involve an awful lot of queuing.. and patience.