I also live off Northcote Rd, and am with Vodafone-had NO signal in my flat at all, but I bought one of their Sure Signal boxes (£50 I think) and I now get full signal in my flat. I was pretty sceptical about it working-but it does. Occasionally it drops out, but for me it's been 95% reliable.

I've switched from 02 to T-Mobile/Orange as they offered a £25 smart phone package .... beginning to wonder if I did the right thing as never had probs with 02 signal but regularly have probs now. Worse still, some people phone and just can't get thro, not even to voicemail! Aargh, it's my business phone so not good!! Worth paying a bit more for 02 in my opinion.

I don't think it is. The area is generally pretty bad. Vodafone will try to sell you one of their black spot overrider thing but I read somewhere that it didn't change much.

You can check all the various mobile networks coverage on the net. There is this site for instance (I just found it on Google)
http://ukmobilecoverage.co.uk/

I had looked at it for my area (I live off Thurleigh Road) and it was unfortunately more or less as bad for all providers.

Although we do find that the iPad or the Blackberry picks up the network much better than my iPhone so it could also be a question of devices..

I live off Northcote Road and i am getting to the end of my tether with how bad the phone signal is. I am on Vodafone, and it really is amazing that the signal is so bad.

Please could you let me know if you are with another provider, and if the signal is much better with them. If there is a consensus then i am going to switch asap!!