Broadband Advice

[Tony Baloney]

No pleasing people. Yap about erection of poles and yap about  blocking roads when burying/repairing cable. Poles are more convenient and have been part of the landscape for decades.

[johnnycool]

No pleasing people. Yap about erection of poles and yap about  blocking roads when burying/repairing cable. Poles are more convenient and have been part of the landscape for decades.

They look to be using a mix of new poles and the old BT poles.
I'm not sure how that works for me as I don't have a rope down the duct but could live with it coming through the gable wall into the attic as I've cat5e up there as well.

The sooner the better for me, BT twisted pair is pish and 3 4G is hit and miss

[johnnycool]

Brown telephone poles & black copper/fibre wire are to me the least offensive when it comes to visual amenity in countryside areas, fairly easy for it to blend in with the surrounding landscape.

IIRC the figure of premises in the north covered by FTTP through Openreach is around 84%, going up to 86% for Openreach & Fibrus combined and 87% capable of a gigabit connection if you thrown Virgin Media into the mix as well. The remaining 13-16% of premises are going to take a decent bit of time to gradually serve though - there's very little low hanging fruit left in terms of premises to still connect up to "Full" fibre fairly easily & cheaply. Fibrus should cover a good lock of those premises eventually through Project Stratum, and Openreach will increase their coverage where they deem practical. Not sure about the FTTP roll out in the Republic, but the FTTP roll out in GB is less ahead compared to NI - Openreach only have around 25% of premises covered for FTTP so far with that increasing around 1% or so a month, with 40% of GB premises able to get a FTTP service (they have more alt-nets providing FTTP over there, compared to just Fibrus over here though another alt-net has started coverage in parts of Derry city, just can't remember it's name right now!) It's kind of history repeating itself, a decade ago the FTTC roll out in the north was much further ahead of that in GB which took some time to catch up.

There's a FTTC Cabinet less than 100 metres from my front door and Openreach tell me they can't connect me or any of my neighbours north of it to the fúckin thing.

Stupid Arseholes.

[johnnycool]

There's a FTTC Cabinet less than 100 metres from my front door and Openreach tell me they can't connect me or any of my neighbours north of it to the fúckin thing.

Stupid Arseholes.

Any notable obstruction in the way? e.g river?

No, nothing. Clear line of sight to my front door FFS. it's on the roadside splay for my sight lines at the entrance. I really kid you not.

I offered to take the satellite picture of the cabinet in relation to my house and email it to Openreach, but computer says no.

[clarshack]

Fibrus getting installed in the morning, there's a duct from the closest pole (50 metres away) going underground to the house so hopefully it will be straightforward enough.

[Franko]

There's a FTTC Cabinet less than 100 metres from my front door and Openreach tell me they can't connect me or any of my neighbours north of it to the fúckin thing.

Stupid Arseholes.

Any notable obstruction in the way? e.g river?

No, nothing. Clear line of sight to my front door FFS. it's on the roadside splay for my sight lines at the entrance. I really kid you not.

I offered to take the satellite picture of the cabinet in relation to my house and email it to Openreach, but computer says no.

Openreach are the single worst company I have ever dealt with

Having a monopoly for too long must do that to companies

[Franko]

Openreach are the single worst company I have ever dealt with

Having a monopoly for too long must do that to companies

Strictly speaking Openreach only deal with ISPs** concerning issues on their network and never directly with ordinary members of the public or other businesses except in specific circumstances e.g. PR announcements. If you have an issue with their network you have to go through your provider who then liaises with Openreach.

There's a small UK ISP called Andrews & Arnold whom have a strong reputation of keeping on the back of Openreach to ensure any faults or problems on their network for A&A customers get fixed until either the job is done or (in rare cases) it's impossible to fix. They have a promise that if you have a fault on your line that your own ISP fails to get resolved satisfactorily, then they'll take it on and if they can't resolve it, they'll let you migrate away again and refund you for the service you paid them. I'm not sure if this helps Johnnycool's issue of being near an FTTC cabinet but not being connected to it, but if I was in his position I'd be tempted to contact A&A to see if they could get Openreach to do this*** before placing any potential migration order with them. A&A are not the cheapest ISP around, but they're not hugely expensive either and depending on what service you order with them the minimum agreed contract with them is either 1, 6 or 12 months. Otherwise, probably best to wait it out until either Openreach or Fibrus start covering your postcode?

https://www.aa.net.uk
https://www.aa.net.uk/broadband/we-will-fix-your-line/



** In theory this would also include phone calls only (no internet) providers on their network, but I doubt any exist these days.
*** There might be an issue where the cabinet in question may have no spare ports to run a new copper pair from, for example. But without technical details it's hard to know.

Unfortunately was forced to deal with them for infrastructure on a new build house.

I have genuinely NEVER dealt with a less helpful company

They were almost impossible to contact, barring through a web form/email

They would then have someone in a call centre phone you back a few days later at a time of their choosing

Invariably, the person on the other end of the phone was unable to answer the query or help in any way

In the end, I had to go through a friend of a friend who worked there

He said it took 2 minutes to sort my problem

But before I went to him, it had rumbled on for 7 months

[Franko]

Unfortunately was forced to deal with them for infrastructure on a new build house.

I have genuinely NEVER dealt with a less helpful company

They were almost impossible to contact, barring through a web form/email

They would then have someone in a call centre phone you back a few days later at a time of their choosing

Invariably, the person on the other end of the phone was unable to answer the query or help in any way

In the end, I had to go through a friend of a friend who worked there

He said it took 2 minutes to sort my problem

But before I went to him, it had rumbled on for 7 months

The lack of contact details is deliberate because as I said earlier, Openreach do not deal directly with members of the public regarding queries with their network unless there is exceptional circumstances.

If the new build house was part of a development, then the developer should have long before been in liaison with Openreach (along with potentially anyone else available locally e.g. Virgin Media, Fibrus etc.) to have them lay/install lines to the new properties during the building phase. This is not compulsory, but is a real dereliction of their service to not have considered any form of telephony/internet connection for their properties unless they make this point absolutely clear to potential buyers - but most reputable developers will do it because it's one less hassle for potential home owners to deal with. For example, Openreach are unlikely to be as willing to lay underground ducting, digging up gardens, footpaths, roads etc. after the properties have been completed or very near completion, compared to during the build phase when this is a lot easier and involves very little public disruption.

If you had issues with the line before signing up with an ISP, you should have needed to contact the developer whom then should have contacted Openreach. If the developer said that you had to contact Openreach yourself, then they were fobbing you off with incorrect info.

If the new build is a one off with no developer involved (i.e. self-build) then the route to take with getting an Openreach line installed is simply via signing up with a ISP or telephone service provider - when this is being done there should be a note to the ISP during the sign up that a new physical line needs to be installed, wherever that is optical fibre or copper pair. Come the day of the installation the Openreach technician (or one of their subcontractors) should come and fit in a new physical line to your property on the day assuming there are no significant issues they may require a second or further day to install the line e.g. new telephone poles needing to be erected. Once a signup has been made via an ISP, any issues with the service need to be done through them - if they tell you that you need to contact Openreach yourself, then they're as dodgy as f**k and I'd cancel/migrate from them ASAP.

In both cases above, you might be contacted by an Openreach representative after the developer or ISP has passed your details on to them. It'll depend on the case at hand.

It's unfortunately common enough for some issues in Openreach's network to drag on a good bit longer than it really needs to be, but everything needs to go through the proper channels for them to get resorted in a reasonable time. They don't sell their services directly, they just wholesale them for others to sell on. This is different to the likes of Virgin Media, Fibrus, AirBand, BlueBox etc. whom are service providers than own & operate their own wired or wireless networks and sell directly to businesses and residents.

You are more helpful than anyone I spoke to in Openreach.

All this advice is well and good - but when some fat fingered fellow has typed your address wrong to some database and ISP's don't therefore have any record of it, it all falls flat pretty quickly.

It was a self build, with poles needing moved for splays and various little bits and pieces - something that speaking to the right person over the phone could have sorted in 30 minutes - as my man on the inside proved

But of course, this bollocks of an outfit makes themselves uncontactable by design - unless of course you are building 50 houses - in which case capitalism kicks in and you are probably assigned an account manager

7 fecking months of emails/web forms followed by sloth-like characters in a call centre in Liverpool who couldn't give a monkeys

"Nah, not showing on my system mate"

Again, the SINGLE WORST outfit I've ever dealt with

[Dougal Maguire]

You're not filling me with confidence here. I got full fibre connected up a few weeks ago and Openreach are coming tomorrow to install my Sky router. However I unplugged the Openreach ONT tonight and plugged it back into an extension lead and now the LOS light is showing red. Hopefully Openreach will be able to sort it ok. Also because of a balls up with BT I have to a new landline number but I still haven't been told what it is yet. A lot is resting on the engineer visit tomorrow

[lfdown2]

Got Fibrus installed a couple of weeks ago, however now can't connect to my work VPN, they tell me I now need a static IP and that I need to pay £8/month for the privilege - can anyone out there advise if this is reasonable or if there is a potential DIY fix?

Also, wondering how best to get the internet round the house, I have just completed a new build and have had CAT6 wired through the house, handy for hard wiring TV / work laptop etc, however how would I best create a wireless network throughout the house? Any help appreciated!

[clarshack]

Got Fibrus installed a couple of weeks ago, however now can't connect to my work VPN, they tell me I now need a static IP and that I need to pay £8/month for the privilege - can anyone out there advise if this is reasonable or if there is a potential DIY fix?

Also, wondering how best to get the internet round the house, I have just completed a new build and have had CAT6 wired through the house, handy for hard wiring TV / work laptop etc, however how would I best create a wireless network throughout the house? Any help appreciated!

my house was wired with CAT6, there's a network switch in the loft that is wired to the Fibrus router in the hall and this switch then feeds to all different rooms in the house.  the wireless signal from the Fibrus router won't reach our sunroom, so basically I just have an ethernet cable connecting from a point in the sunroom to my old Asus router which then gives us a wireless signal in the sunroom.

Not sure how you would need a fixed IP to connect to your work VPN? is there something at your work end that maybe needs changed instead?

[armaghniac]

Got Fibrus installed a couple of weeks ago, however now can't connect to my work VPN, they tell me I now need a static IP and that I need to pay £8/month for the privilege - can anyone out there advise if this is reasonable or if there is a potential DIY fix?

Did you have a fixed IP number before this? Probably not, the work VPN should work on a wireless network in an hotel etc.