Broadband installation date huge delay

[NeonXIII]

Hi all, will try to keep this brief as I'm sure you've heard it all before - I'm not looking to complain, just to understand exactly where I am and what I need to do from here.

I've just moved into a new house and ordered Sky full fibre. I've been given a date of 6th June for a Sky engineer to visit, and a date of 30th May for Openreach to do their thing beforehand. Everything was going great until I got the dreaded message about a delay and when I checked my help requests page, this is the latest message I've received:

"Openreach need to lay the casings which will protect the cables from damage. This will be from the telephone exchange to your property. Further work will be required when this is completed. You will receive a text with an update on your order on 21/08/2024"

A minimum three month delay really isn't great given we work from home, but I'm trying to understand exactly how things stand right now and whether this means I need to seek an alternative internet provider.

I want to understand if this date is just when I would receive the full fibre speeds, but the box will still work at a lower speed using the existing OpenReach socket in my home?

Here's my broadband checker info, but I'm not entirely sure what it all means:

My Sky app still shows my full fibre install date as 6th June, so I'm keen to hear from anyone that has been in a similar position whether or not I still need to book time off for this or not given the OpenReach update - I'd ask Sky directly but I've been bounced around several times without ever reaching a real person on the phone already.

Any help/advice appreciated, thanks!

[TimmyBGood]

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@NeonXIII wrote:

I want to understand if this date is just when I would receive the full fibre speeds, but the box will still work at a lower speed using the existing OpenReach socket in my home?

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No, it won't.

The key information is 'UG partial Direct in Ground' which means the current copper cable is directly buried with no existing duct for a new optical circuit to arrive through.

Unfortunately even though your address isn't in a 'fibre priority programme' area, in practice no ISP will now provision over copper where FTTP is even nominally available.

[TimmyBGood]

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@NeonXIII wrote:

A minimum three month delay really isn't great given we work from home, but I'm trying to understand exactly how things stand right now and whether this means I need to seek an alternative internet provider.

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Note that any other Openreach ISP will be in the same position: that includes BT/EE/Plusnet, TalkTalk, Vodaphone, Zen and most of the rest.

Virgin and altnet (private fibre-laying) ISPs have their own, geographically limited networks which don't show up on the BT Wholesale checker.

[jamesn123]

@NeonXIII 

There will be no lower speed to be had as any area that has FTTP available is moved to 'FTTP Priority' which means any new orders placed will only be over Fibre and not over the old copper cabling. This unfortunately means you will likely be without broadband for a few months until Openreach can get the correct permission to install the ducting. 

I would arrange to have some sort of mobile 4G/5G broadband put in for the time being

[NeonXIII]

Thanks guys, I was hoping you wouldn't say that but I've already accepted my fate either way.

Going to look into a temporary solution to bridge the gap and hope we don't encounter any more problems until then

[Jenny+Jane+77]

Intrigued of your outcome! I'm four month in from not getting fibre boardband , I cannot bear anymore phone calls to Sky they are vile to deal with. Did you get compensation ?