Why can't anyone (so far) provide a broadband service to my sister's house

[JohnMcL7]

Since my original post, and discussed above, in spite of attempts by both my sister, and me, to find someone who would offer broadband, and failing, the next day the same providers suddenly started to offer a connection.

Thanks for the link, that looks like a useful resource

I did see those posts but without any explanation for the change I wouldn't be surprised to find the work doesn't go ahead although fingers crossed it works out without any further hassle.

 

[JonathanRyan]

We had this in a new build property (there are probably threads on here from 4 years ago about it). The cabinet had fibre. Then they ran some very shaky copper all the way under the new estate via an excessively long route. It provided max guaranteed speeds of next to nothing.

I looked at extending the cable and Open Reach wanted 20k which for the whole estate was quite reasonable but got vetoed by one person who was worried about her roses and didn't really see the point in the internet.

At the time, the best option was 4G which was best described as "pitiful". Not enough to stream iPlayer reliably or sustain a Zoom connection for more than 15 mins. Also, many banks wouldn't work with 4G on Windows as they expected a different OS and it messed with their authentication.

Of course, we moved.

 

[myotis]

We had this in a new build property (there are probably threads on here from 4 years ago about it). The cabinet had fibre. Then they ran some very shaky copper all the way under the new estate via an excessively long route. It provided max guaranteed speeds of next to nothing.

I looked at extending the cable and Open Reach wanted 20k which for the whole estate was quite reasonable but got vetoed by one person who was worried about her roses and didn't really see the point in the internet.

At the time, the best option was 4G which was best described as "pitiful". Not enough to stream iPlayer reliably or sustain a Zoom connection for more than 15 mins. Also, many banks wouldn't work with 4G on Windows as they expected a different OS and it messed with their authentication.

Of course, we moved.

I am confident my sister won't be moving

 

[JonathanRyan]

I am confident my sister won't be moving

20 grand to OpenReach is cheaper

 

[myotis]

20 grand to OpenReach is cheaper

She won't be doing that either

 

[Matthew Grey]

Useful to know, but from the Openreach page where it said FTTC was available at the address they were linking to BT and Sky, among others, as potential providers.

It could still be a lack of connections, as suggested earlier, which could mean BT/EE are affected but Sky can use their own equipment

And yes, my search through BT seemed to jump in and out of EE pages.

As an aside, I would have a look at how you are spelling "Landacape"

Well spotted! I've corrected it, thanks.

 

[onomatopoeia]

I'd try Andrew's and Arnold. They aren't the cheapest but they're switched on and if it's possible they will be able to. I had a hardware line fault. Zen were useless and never fixed it. Moved to A and A and it was fixed immediately and I've got better speeds than I ever had with zen.

A proper ISP, been with them since 2003. They once threatened BT Wholesale with legal action for non-performance after about a dozen visits from Openreach technicians failed to resolve a line fault and the fault kept being bounced back to the ISP, even though everyone knew the problem was the dropwire. It was just very difficult to replace due to location and needed a lot of persistance from the ISP culminating in engaging counsel before it was resolved.

 

[gman]

I ditched BT ages ago after they kept screwing me about with perpetual promises of full fibre. They tried to trick me into signing up for a 2 year copper contract on the promise that full fibre would be available to automatically upgrade 2 months into the contract. This was back in July 2023. They still aren't offering full fibre lol and their customer services are probably the worst I've ever experienced, both domestic and business.I went with Brillband on the Cityfibre infrastructure. 1Gbps up and down and at half the price that BT wanted.

Meanwhile, in Arran we get around 2Mbps with the BT copper, but full fibre is available. Need to upgrade, 2Mbps is unbearable when the family are all on their devices, so I can sympathise. There's places in Arran where they know that they will never get any form of decent internet and they use Starlink instead.

 

[myotis]

I ditched BT ages ago after they kept screwing me about with perpetual promises of full fibre. They tried to trick me into signing up for a 2 year copper contract on the promise that full fibre would be available to automatically upgrade 2 months into the contract. This was back in July 2023. They still aren't offering full fibre lol and their customer services are probably the worst I've ever experienced, both domestic and business.I went with Brillband on the Cityfibre infrastructure. 1Gbps up and down and at half the price that BT wanted.

Meanwhile, in Arran we get around 2Mbps with the BT copper, but full fibre is available. Need to upgrade, 2Mbps is unbearable when the family are all on their devices, so I can sympathise. There's places in Arran where they know that they will never get any form of decent internet and they use Starlink instead.

It's all such a pain to sort out or keep on top of, and as I get older I become less and less willing to have to deal with these kinds of distractions to my daily life.

 

[Jannyfox]

I ditched BT ages ago after they kept screwing me about with perpetual promises of full fibre. They tried to trick me into signing up for a 2 year copper contract on the promise that full fibre would be available to automatically upgrade 2 months into the contract. This was back in July 2023. They still aren't offering full fibre lol and their customer services are probably the worst I've ever experienced, both domestic and business.I went with Brillband on the Cityfibre infrastructure. 1Gbps up and down and at half the price that BT wanted.

Meanwhile, in Arran we get around 2Mbps with the BT copper, but full fibre is available. Need to upgrade, 2Mbps is unbearable when the family are all on their devices, so I can sympathise. There's places in Arran where they know that they will never get any form of decent internet and they use Starlink instead.

To be fair BT's inability to offer full fibre with them will be down to Openreach who provide the infrastructure BT (and others) use, and Openreach's build plans change. Openreach full fibre enabled my village a few years ago...... except for the little bit where I am. We were on the by-the-end-of-2026 build list. We've just been taken off, and now there are 'no plans'. For just a few houses, no other network providers are going to come in. Fortunately my FTTC is perfectly adequate

 

[gman]

To be fair BT's inability to offer full fibre with them will be down to Openreach who provide the infrastructure BT (and others) use, and Openreach's build plans change. Openreach full fibre enabled my village a few years ago...... except for the little bit where I am. We were on the by-the-end-of-2026 build list. We've just been taken off, and now there are 'no plans'. For just a few houses, no other network providers are going to come in. Fortunately my FTTC is perfectly adequate

It wouldn't surprise me, I've had a lot of problems with Openreach with regard to their BT Net service. Followed by BT themselves and their horrific customer services (I won't ruin the thread going into detail) and not forgetting the third arm, BT Local Business. Two years of incompetence, lying, breaking promises and refusal to fulfil a written contract was enough to make sure I will never take on a new service with them. On the domestic side, they tried to screw me as well and even tried to get out of honouring legal contractual cooldown periods after lying about full fibre.

Brillband on the other hand; wonderful! When the engineers came on time and installed the cabling into my house the IP hadn't been assigned so I couldn't get online, so the owner of Brillband offered to come around personally in the morning (which was a Saturday) with a 5G router to get me online. It turned out not to be necessary as I got switched on and whilst they were still a relatively small company that's still fantastic service.

Sorry for the rant.

 

[Musicman]

A proper ISP, been with them since 2003. They once threatened BT Wholesale with legal action for non-performance after about a dozen visits from Openreach technicians failed to resolve a line fault and the fault kept being bounced back to the ISP, even though everyone knew the problem was the dropwire. It was just very difficult to replace due to location and needed a lot of persistance from the ISP culminating in engaging counsel before it was resolved.

Seconded.

Zen certainly are not the cheapest but in the quarter of a century of dealing with them across many different domestic and business circuits (both for myself, family and clients when i was an IT consultant) I have never been dissatisfied. Staff are always a pleasure to talk to and their tech support actually know what they are talking about.

 

[jamesev]

To be fair BT's inability to offer full fibre with them will be down to Openreach who provide the infrastructure BT (and others) use, and Openreach's build plans change. Openreach full fibre enabled my village a few years ago...... except for the little bit where I am. We were on the by-the-end-of-2026 build list. We've just been taken off, and now there are 'no plans'. For just a few houses, no other network providers are going to come in. Fortunately my FTTC is perfectly adequate

But BT and Openreach are both owned by BT Group although have to operate as separate companies