topic Re: Is This A Scam? in Broadband

Is This A Scam?

Nicholas32 — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 12:03:50 GMT

Unusually, I've just received a WhatsApp message supposedly from Sky, offering to replace the final few feet of copper wire to my house with fibre, free of charge. I rang Sky customer service to discuss this and they told me they have no record of any such message, adding that Sky doesn't use WhatsApp to contact customers, and raising the possibility that it's a scam. Yet that WhatsApp message seems oddly genuine. Does anyone have any similar experience?

Many thanks,

Nick

Re: Is This A Scam?

GD1 — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 12:18:52 GMT

@Nicholas32 It may be genuine, and it would be full fibre not the "final few feet"

Best way to tell if Full Fibre is available on the Openreach Network try here https://www.openreach.com/broadband-network/fibre-availability

Or via CityFibre https://cityfibre.com/

Re: Is This A Scam?

caesarome — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 12:34:33 GMT

@Nicholas32

The message you received could well be from Sky as you can read about here:

https://www.sky.com/help/articles/full-fibre-broadband-at-no-extra-cost

Re: Is This A Scam?

Nicholas32 — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 13:13:55 GMT

Many thanks GD1. Oddly, the " last few feet "bit is correct in this case,: we're full-fibre right up to the telegraph pole outside our house...then it's copper cable to our wall. The crazy thing is that Sky denies all knowledge of having messaged me over this. But I now suspect (thanks to another answer to my post) the contact may actually be genuine. Thanks again, anyway.

Re: Is This A Scam?

GD1 — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 13:32:15 GMT

@Nicholas32 wrote:

Many thanks GD1. Oddly, the " last few feet "bit is correct in this case,: we're full-fibre right up to the telegraph pole outside our house...then it's copper cable to our wall. The crazy thing is that Sky denies all knowledge of having messaged me over this. But I now suspect (thanks to another answer to my post) the contact may actually be genuine. Thanks again, anyway.

I'm not aware of Openreach having such a setup, is it not FTTC (Fibre to the Cabinet), then copper from the cabinet to your home via the pole?

It would be highly unusual to have fibre to the pole then copper from the pole to the home as there would need to be a very large cabinet on the pole to convert the line from fibre to copper (hence why there are large green cabinets on the street doing this already).

Re: Is This A Scam?

TimmyBGood — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 15:36:42 GMT

@GD1 @Nicholas32

It's probably G.fast from a pole-mounted pod, now being over-built with FTTP.

Re: Is This A Scam?

GD1 — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 15:34:08 GMT

@TimmyBGood wrote:

@GD1 @Nicholas32

It's probably G.fast

Even that is from a street cabinet though?

Re: Is This A Scam?

TimmyBGood — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 15:45:51 GMT

@GD1

Not necessarily: G.fast could potentially be much more local than full cabinets, which is how it got the higher speeds than FTTC because it was fibre much closer to the subscription addresses.

Apparently the main obstacle to its wider rollout was powering the distribution pods.

Re: Is This A Scam?

GD1 — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 15:41:22 GMT

@TimmyBGood wrote:

@GD1

Not necessarily: G.fast was much more local than full cabinets, which is how it got the higher speeds than FTTC because it was fibre much closer to the subscription addresses.

Apparently the main obstacle to its wider rollout was powering the distribution pods.

And cost 🙂

Re: Is This A Scam?

TimmyBGood — Mon, 17 Aug 2026 15:48:36 GMT

@Nicholas32 wrote:

The crazy thing is that Sky denies all knowledge of having messaged me over this.

If it is G.fast then that can apparently do strange things to the sales platform.