As telecommunication services push on with their plans to shut down Australia's 3G service next month, regional West Australian residents fear they will be left with little to no mobile or internet connectivity on the 4G network. 

After 20 years of operation, Telstra and Optus will shut down the 3G network on October 28. 

Gary Cail farms with his family at Wubin, more than 300 kilometres north-east of Perth, in the Jibberding area.

He said his farm was surrounded by three mobile phone towers, approximately 30km apart and he enjoyed good 3G coverage across most of his properties. 

But he was concerned a mandatory switch from 3G to 4G would leave his service weak and unreliable.

"I was spraying a paddock with nice long runs so I thought I'll swap back and forth between 3G and 4G while I'm spraying," he said.

Mr Cail said he had been in contact with Telstra to ensure his phone was suitable for 4G and had sought advice on the best settings for his external antennas, but his concerns about "terrible signal" remained.

He said good mobile connectivity was essential in modern farming and for safety with people often working alone.

"We are doing more and more with bigger machinery and less staff now, but part of that system working is to have backup. We do a lot with phone calls to mechanics, photos to agronomists. It all relies on our phone signal," Mr Cail said.

"A lot of the technology updates that are coming rely on phone and internet signal, so it's going to be really frustrating to go backwards. I would have thought we should be improving not taking a backward step."

The Cails do not have a landline in their house as they have had good 3G coverage.

Mr Cail said the 3G shutdown should be reconsidered by telcos. 

In a submission to a WA parliamentary inquiry into regional telecommunications earlier this year, the North Eastern Wheatbelt Regional Organisation of Councils (NEWROC) highlighted the need for reliable internet and phone coverage across the seven local governments it represented, citing a range of reasons including emergency services, health care, and business management.

"The NEWROC is concerned that the transition to 4G and 5G will result in more black spots, without any reception, whether this be temporarily or permanently," the submission said.

"NEWROC members are genuinely concerned that coverage under the 4G and 5G network will be poor as we understand the telecommunication carriers are updating towers from central control, working on generic templates of what coverage is like in an area — not improving or expanding the coverage." 

Telstra regional manager for WA Boyd Brown said 3G would be switched off on October 28, and Telstra was confident it would provide coverage of 4G wherever there was 3G. 

He encouraged people with concerns to check the positioning of external antennas, the compatibility of equipment and app settings for their Cel-Fi repeater as this would resolve most connectivity challenges, or contact Telstra. 

"There is not a uniform standard across devices [for bars on phones] unfortunately, but if you do a speed test you'll find that with a lesser amount of bars on your device on 4G, you'll still get a superior data speed than what you'd achieve on 3G in the majority of cases," he said. 

"We are using the network differently to what we were 20 years ago. Back then, 99 per cent of the traffic on the network was all about a phone call.

"3G is fantastic for a phone call and sending an SMS. What we need for the way we use the network today is all about data and streaming … and 3G simply cannot do that. 

"We are in a position where we have to move forward and that's why [the shift to] 4G and 5G, so that we can make sure we can handle the amount of traffic."