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Congratulations BT/Openreach - Lac (3rd Oct 2017 - 13:07:15) Another few weeks and it will be the 1st birthday of the brand new broadband cabinet 13 at the Griggs Green end of Liphook. A whole 1.2 miles from the exchange. A cause for celebration you might think. Well no, because we are still no closer to fibre being installed to the cabinet. In that year they have managed to install 2 metres of electric cable from the adjacent power supply, install the computer equipment and connect the new cabinet to the old one. Job done you might say, but no. There is no fibre. The old copper wires run through ducts which are blocked after only 50 years of use. Who would have thought? So we wait for fibre, as indeed do some other cabinets in the Liphook area. Everyone who pays inflated prices to watch football on BT Sport might wonder if the money would have been better spent on providing universal fibre to the home, never mind inadequate provision to the cabinet. I don't use social media but I would request anyone who does to spread the word on BT/Openreach incompetence. They make Network Rail look efficient.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Andy (3rd Oct 2017 - 13:52:31) Fibre has been "typically available within 4 months" to this cabinet for at least 4 years now. I've given up. And the existing super slow broadband seems to be getting slower by the day.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Debbie (3rd Oct 2017 - 14:31:45) I’ve got two teenage girls and the slow WiFi is the bane of my life! I think the fact that we share a cabinet with Old Thorns which has grown at least 10 fold over the last few years could have a lot to do with how slow it has become. It would be great to have fibre and at least be able to compare sky TV with providers that use fibre because at the moment they have us by the short and curlies so to speak!

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Jonathan (4th Oct 2017 - 09:37:06) Our cabinet (16, in Station Road) has been saying "Fibre Enabled" and "We're connecting power to the new fibre cabinet and joining the new fibre lines to the existing copper network. You can't order a fibre service today but typically it'll be available to your premises within the next four months." for well over 4 months now. It's ridiculous.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - lac (3rd Nov 2017 - 10:00:22) Update on Cabinet 13 - Griggs Green fibre cabinet. Openreach (or its contractors) are busily digging holes to "clear duct blockages" in Longmoor Rd to "enable spine cabling works" which I believe is their jargon for finally putting fibre cable in. I've e mailed Openreach 3 times in the last month asking when the cabinet will be enabled and they said "we will respond" within 7 days". Needless to say no response and after 2 reminders still nothing! Hampshire Broadband however, did respond promptly and said the fibre connection will be made by the end of November. All will then be ready for someone at Openreach to switch it on which I'm told should mean it going "live by the end of the year". Why it takes another month to update some software and remotely switch the cabinet to fibre is another mystery. So nearly 3 years after fibre was available to most of Liphook we finally have an end point for our fibre. It's 8 months later than the plan put forward by Openreach only 12 months ago! Fibre to the home? Don't hold your breath but do support competition in this vital economic area which monopoly Openreach are strangling in spite of the glossy PR stuff they churn out.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Debby OK (9th Nov 2017 - 13:31:52) After several emails over the last couple of years, this is the latest reply I have had re Cabinet 13. Thank you for contacting us again. Please accept my apologies for the delay in providing fibre to your property. I have checked my system for the recent updates and found that , you should be able to order fibre broadband towards the Second Week of November 2017. We often find unforeseen challenges and complexities that we simply couldn’t plan for. These may need either more time to work around or a different solution altogether. Our published dates in most cases are accurate. However, because of the aforementioned unforeseen challenges the estimated published date can be moved. We strive to share as much information as we possibly can to help make your choices. Sometimes there are challenges in physically deploying the network which can cause delays and that’s why we’ve had to move your delivery date back. The reasons could include planning rules, power provision, space constraints, etc. Once signed up we’ll get in contact with you as soon as we have further information or when your cabinet upgrade has been completed. Here's Hoping! Debby

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Peter (9th Nov 2017 - 20:05:59) Re spine cabling, a maximum of 30 houses are connected to a spine for fibre to the home (FTTP), for superfast or FTTC they will need one or more spines per cabinet.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - lac (9th Nov 2017 - 22:26:59) Further info re cabinet 13. More duct work to enable spine fibre cabling will take place next week - 11th to 15th. From Forest Lane Close to the junction of Longmoor Rd/Deers Hut. That only leaves 100 metres to cabinet 13. I doubt if "towards 2nd week" in November will be happening but activation of cabinet does seem to be creeping towards completion. I did have a phone message from Openreach saying there was an issue about permissions for power to the cabinet as they needed to gain access to private land. As the power supply is already connected, 6 ft away from the cabinet and immediately adjacent to the footpath I'm suspicious of this story. The information from Openreach is so vague it's funny. Hampshire Broadband indicated "by the end of the year" for activation. All fingers crossed that someone appreciates the importance of fast broadband and actually displays some sense of urgency.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - A (5th Dec 2017 - 09:47:33) Still no sign of superfast at cabinet 13. But are they doing something with the cabinet currently as the broadband seems to be grinding to a halt in Griggs Green lately? It's like the old dial-up days watching a website slowly appear before your eyes over a 30 second period. Switch the router on and off and things improve for an hour or so and then it begins to grind almost to a halt again.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Barbara (5th Dec 2017 - 10:41:38) Why are they only doing this one cabinet why not all the rural aeas?

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - lac (5th Dec 2017 - 13:37:51) A very good question Barbara. Too expensive and difficult say the useless Openreach (BT). The reality is this monopoly is not able to deliver decent service. They want to keep copper cables to the door as its hugely profitable for them. They have been paid for decades ago and are the classic "cash cow". Elsewhere in Europe and beyond fibre to the PREMISES is being implemented fast. In the mean time, locally, there are several cabinets waiting for connection to fibre which are way behind schedule. The local work on "spine cabling" seems to consist of a couple of blokes digging a hole and then filling it in. They keep scheduling the work (look at roadworks.org) and then cancelling it or digging one hole and moving on. The fibre cabinet for Griggs Green actually has moss growing on it, its been there so long (Oct 16) and still no connection. I hasten to add they have also trousered the money from Hampshire Broadband (taxpayers money) to pay for this "rural broadband". BT keep making pathetic excuses without actually saying what is holding things up. This make me highly suspicious of the real reasons which as far as I can see is simple incompetence.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - lac (8th Dec 2017 - 13:40:58) The painfully slow BT Openreach fibre to cabinet roll out to the remaining cabinets in Liphook is making progress. In the absence of any useful information from Openreach (the cheques in the post excuses), I have resorted to roadworks.org to figure out what is going on. Remember those cabinets not yet connected to fibre were supposed to be completed by April 17. According to roadworks.org, early in the new year, fibre cable is actually being installed at points around central Liphook. Given the pace of the work I'm hoping for the completion of fibre to cabinet before April 18. This would mean 18 months from cabinet build to turning the cabinets on and a full year beyond the planned time. Cabinets 13 and 16 will then be connected to fibre. My frustration with the planning and project management of this fiasco is palpable. After watching the Oak Park roundabout and services installation take 8 months, I shouldn't be surprised. It took the Victorian railway builders 20 years to connect every town and city in England to the rail network using picks and shovels. if Openreach were involved we'd still be using horse and carts.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - JBS (8th Dec 2017 - 14:15:41) Yesterday I walked past two contractors from BT looking at the cableway markings on the pavement in Longmoor Road, and discussing how many obstructions they had cleared in the ducting, so far! This morning, as I passed, there were two vans parked in Forest Lane End. One of the covers in the pavement was 'up', and they were passing rods preparatory to running the fibre optic cable along the duct. Things are "MOVING", but at the customary slow pace!

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Bob (8th Dec 2017 - 14:25:56) Is it possible to find out which cabinets are actually connected and a schedule for hooking up the others? Any advice appreciated. Can't find any information directly from BT/Openreach

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - lac (9th Dec 2017 - 13:46:30) well done for listening skills re Openreach and duct blockages. What baffles me is the copper cables have been in for at least 50 years and they are surprised the ducts are blocked! The guys doing the job are obviously not being paid by results! In answer to Bob re cabinets try telecom-tarifs.co.uk/codelook. They seem to be all things telecom and you can find out which cabinets serve all the post codes with a bit of digging around.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - barbara (9th Dec 2017 - 17:17:01) I am pleased there is progress but is there any progress for the rural parts of the Parish?

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - lac (10th Dec 2017 - 14:24:37) Liphook exchange cabinet 15 near Hammer Vale is in West Sussex and undergoing "field survey", live by Sept 18. (these dates are not adhered to). Cabinet 8 in Chiltley Lane, also in West Sussex, is undergoing field survey but was due to be live by Dec 16, so thats a year late already. All that can be done is pressurise Openreach (and Hampshire broadband project) to make progress. Writing to your MP wouldn't go amiss either. Frustratingly I was in the Lake District two weeks ago and in a tiny village in the middle of nowhere was the fibre enabled cabinet! There seems to be no logic applied to the fibre roll out. How anyone could describe Liphook as "rural" is beyond me. For our cabinet (13) we are exactly 1.2 miles from the exchange. I could have dug a new trench by hand and laid a fibre cable to the exchange in the time its taken so far (3 years since most of Liphook was fibre enabled).

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Faye (10th Dec 2017 - 20:19:42) Re cabinet 13, I received the below response on 27th nov. Obvs not very helpful as it is now mid December. Thanks for contacting us about fibre in your area. I've had a look at this and can see the cabinet 13 of exchange LIPHOOK which serves you, isn't currently fibre enabled. However, your area is a part of a government scheme to install Fibre to the cabinet. The current estimated completion date is beginning of December 2017. As I'm sure you can appreciate; installing fibre is a technical complex civil engineering project. Therefore any dates we give you are only estimates and are subject to change. When we plan fibre jobs we have to take into account all aspects of the work required and give realistic timescales, however these are provisional dates only and are barring no unforeseen issues along the way. My advice to you is to keep checking our website for updates. When fibre is available and orders can be accepted, this information will be given via this link: homeandwork.openreach.co.uk/... Our website will also give the details of CPs who offer fibre products to their customers. Best Wishes, Amrita Fibre Enquiries Team

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - lac (11th Dec 2017 - 18:34:47) Faye, the message you received on 27th November is almost word for word the same one I have received several times. Only the time scale varies! The same vague excuses for delay and giving different dates! The problem is very simple. Openreach don't have enough staff allocated to finishing this project and like a dodgy builder are running round doing several different jobs trying to keep everyone happy. This is classic poor planning and project management linked to a basic "don't care" attitude which seems to infuse Openreach culture. Lets all keep the pressure up on this complaining about this appalling service from Openreach.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Faye (12th Dec 2017 - 19:00:11) Mmm I can’t say the email I received made me feel particularly hopeful. I will email them again. I wish there was something more we could do. Surely Old Thorns is connected to the same cabinet?... I wonder if they are doing anything to help.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Dave Hall (13th Dec 2017 - 11:11:59) Hi there, only been living here a few months, however I've just received the same email. Thought I would share their contact details for anyone else wishing to hassle them. Amrita Dhani sifibreenquiriesmop@openreach.co.uk On 13/12/2017 10:41, Amrita Dhani wrote: > > Hello Dave, > > Thanks for contacting us about fibre in your area. I understand that you have been waiting to get fibre and I am sorry for the delay in providing these services. > > I've had a look at this and can see the cabinet 13 of exchange LIPHOOK which serves you, isn't currently fibre enabled. However, your area is a part of a government scheme to install Fibre to the cabinet. > > The current estimated completion date is end of December 2017. As I'm sure you can appreciate; installing fibre is a technical complex civil engineering project. Therefore any dates we give you are only estimates and are subject to change. > > When we plan fibre jobs we have to take into account all aspects of the work required and give realistic timescales, however these are provisional dates only and are barring no unforeseen issues along the way. > > My advice to you is to keep checking our website for updates. When fibre is available and orders can be accepted, this information will be given via this link: > > https://www.homeandwork.openreach.co.uk/fibre-broadband/rural-broadband.aspx > > Our website will also give the details of CPs who offer fibre products to their customers. > > Best Wishes, > > Amrita > > Fibre Enquiries Team

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Lac (14th Dec 2017 - 15:47:06) Openreach just seem to change the dates and it’s always one month further on. Oct, Nov, and now Dec. I suspect the e mails are fielded by foreign call centres. Trying to get real information from them is like obtaining information from GCHQ. They are very secretive, I suspect because they realise we would then know how useless they are. The end of Dec deadline will not happen as in early January they have scheduled fibre work in Liphook. Fortunately they have to inform highways people of any road works and these can be found on roadworks.org. There must be a clear project plan somewhere which gives real information but it must be a state secret. All we can do is bombard them with complaints until they realise we actually do want fibre NOW. When we do finally get it I plead with potential customers of BT to use competitor products and not encourage this useless monopoly.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Ian (14th Dec 2017 - 16:39:58) Faye - I am intrigued to know you reasons why you are linking this issue with Old Thorns. Why would you expect them to assist in this?

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Willo (14th Dec 2017 - 21:52:29) Just curious why such desperation for fibre? Decent broadband speeds on copper are generally ok for most people? What do you hope fibre will give you?

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - A (14th Dec 2017 - 22:21:44) Willo - Fibre will give much faster broadband speeds and, as a result, better WiFi speeds in the average home. You cannot get SkyQ without fibre and if there are any gamers in a household, they often struggle at peak times on an Xbox or PS4 when playing online. 6 Mbps on the existing copper broadband is way behind what most fibre users will experience. Download and upload speeds will be higher for films and live streaming - I could go on but suffice to say moving from copper to fibre is as big a leap as when we all moved from dial-up to copper. Hope that helps.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - James (14th Dec 2017 - 23:46:03) Hello all, Fibre generally brings faster network speeds than copper due to the materials in them, therefor you will receive a better internet connection in both download and upload speed. You ping will also improve (how quickly you connect to a server). Although I do not live in the Old Thorns area I am aware that the internet speed in that specific area is dreadful, and Old Thorns are the prime suspects for this. This is because of there high capacity, although I do not know how many guests they have a day I can presume they have a lot especially this time of year, and therefore the demand for internet greatly widens, and therefore leaving people who live within that small area vulnerable to slower internet speeds. Do your research before you moan next time please… Have a g’day -James

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Richard (15th Dec 2017 - 09:08:12) It is also possible that Old Thorns have a leased line into their site, and do not use the shared broadband network for their Internet Access. For a site of that size I would rather hope they are not dependent upon consumer grade ADSL!

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - lac (15th Dec 2017 - 13:30:20) I suppose the query as to why we need faster broadband speeds is similar to the questions posed by those asking why we needed railways when the horse and cart is perfectly adequate. Our future economic success depends on high speed fibre networks just like we currently depend on our (inadequate) motorways and railways. Successive governments have allowed a bureaucratic monopoly to provide nearly all of the fibre network. The local situation in parts of Liphook is representative of the rest of the country. BT thought they could use copper to provide adequate speeds and avoid the huge spend on fibre. (Instead they spent billions on football, pushing up the price of watching it to all!). Unfortunately they backed the wrong horse as their new technology to send fast speeds over copper proved totally inadequate. The news this week that a bunch of students in a university had managed to send a 3.5megabit signal down wet string illustrates the problem. The local average speed down the ancient copper network is 5 megabit per second. Fibre to the cabinet gives us up to 100. Fibre to the home gives us a 1000, already commonplace in much of Europe! There will always be those who prefer quill and parchment and good luck to them. The future depends on digital and fibre.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - A (15th Dec 2017 - 15:20:43) lac - I'm looking into 4g Broadband in the short term on a 30 day contract. 18mbps should be possible on 4g which is 3 times what we currently get. Also, I suspect 5g and beyond will end up being much quicker than the cabled broadband anyway so this idea may well be the future!

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - James (15th Dec 2017 - 18:05:56) Dear Richard, Do you really expect Old Thorns to lease a broadband line? Seriously? They make a profit by not doing this. Just because it is a site that holds a few thousand people doesn’t mean they lease out a line just for themselves. I regularly go to the Starbucks there to do some work out of hours and there internet speed is dreadful. G’day -James

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Richard (15th Dec 2017 - 19:06:58) And I would live to have 1Gbps to the premises...apparently Ebbsfleet had it first. (Maybe wrong on that). The rumour was somebody from Ofcom (BT's regulator) lived there. Draw your own conclusions...!

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - lac (16th Dec 2017 - 10:38:12) I live in hope that 5G livens up the internet speed but point out that with only a year or two to 5G roll out, we haven't even obtained 3G from our own local mast on top of Weavers Down (I think O2 and EE "own" the mast transmitters). As most of these masts are connected to fibre networks, it may be no coincidence that fibre in the Griggs Green/Longmoor area is still to arrive? As a non expert in this area I can only observe what I see and the TV adverts for Tech, show a world which is like comparing Bullet trains to my proverbial horse and cart. e.g. it took 2 months to upload my family/photo collection to the cloud. Upload speed is 0.5MBS! To our friend who asks why its important, a home worker trying to upload a Powerpoint presentation would need to take a long coffee break (maybe even lunch) to let his boss or colleague have the presentation. Hardly a help to productivity but illustrates the problem. A CAD/CAM worker might as well do the commute as it takes less time. Download

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Richard (17th Dec 2017 - 08:36:50) James, when you at Starbucks, are you connecting over WiFi? If so most likely on the 2,4Ghz band, which has good range, but is shared with things that interfere like microwave ovens! And WiFi is a shared resource. Liphook does need faster broadband, and ADSL2 no longer really cuts it, but to maximise what little is available, people need to ensure that their WiFi is working well, eg. Don't broadcast on the same WiFi channels as your neighbours. If you can use a cable to some stuff, plug it in.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - H (2nd Jan 2018 - 19:18:00) Now that BT / Openreach are accepting orders for cabinet 13 I should have 56 Mbps or thereabouts on 12th Jan. I'll report back on actual speed, here's hoping for a substantial improvement. Amazon Prime basically does not work at the moment for any streaming as the speed is soooo slow. By the way, I had to have a bit of a row with BT as part of the upgrade - when I renewed my contract a few months back I was very clear in confirming that I would not be penalised on any upgrade if and when fibre became available. The prices I was initially offered were ridiculous but a bit of perseverance should get you a decent deal.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Jonathan (3rd Jan 2018 - 10:19:01) Looks like Cabinet 16 is accepting orders now!

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Mrs M (3rd Jan 2018 - 18:30:55) I’m on the Berg and have had intermittent broadband for a couple of weeks, although it seems to be OK now. My main problem is that my landline is dead and has been for three weeks. My provider is Sky, who tell me that this is a “common fault” (which means that it affects more lines than mine) and it has been passed to Open Reach to fix. To my astonishment I had a phone call from a BT engineer on New Year’s Day to say that the fault appeared to be in the exchange. He told me that unfortunately, the exchange is behind the sorting office and as it was NY day, it was all locked up so he was going to refer it back to my provider. The upside of all this is that I’ve had finally to drag myself into the 21st century and get a more modern mobile than the antiquated pay-as-you-go with three letters and one number on each key I had before. Texts took forever!

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - Faye (3rd Jan 2018 - 22:10:44) Just in case anyone’s interested, I am on cabinet 13 and have just ordered Fibre with Sky. It will be up and running on 24th Jan and they guaranteed a speed of 17Mbps but could and should be between 19-29Mbps. Better than the 5-7Mbps I’m currently on!

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - H (10th Jan 2018 - 16:21:11) Here we go again - BT have moved the date now from 12th to 18th Jan (without telling me either, I only found out by phoning up to enquire where the router was which was due today). Apparently, it's taking longer to install in the cabinet than they had planned which is odd as the status of the cabinet had only recently moved to "accepting orders." BT not covering themselves in glory again.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - lac (11th Jan 2018 - 13:26:19) I too have a 24th Jan Sky fibre broadband date. I agree with ringing up and haggling. I have the higher broadband speed for only a £1 a month extra. On a technical note the fibre speed to the cabinet is 72mbs. However as the line to the home is copper, the signal falls off the longer the cable run. I will get about 40mbs as I am about 500m away as the cable runs. You can google the fall off in signal strength from the cabinet as it's a standard curve but basically unless you live within 1000m metres of the cabinet, you will not see that much of an improvement. If you lived in Spain you would have fibre to the home (96% popn). Due to Openreach efficiency we are at about 5% and plans for expanding fibre to the home are next to useless.The plan seems to be "let's blackmail the Government to give us more cash to put in more fibre". Ho hum!

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - H (20th Jan 2018 - 07:49:04) We're now getting download speeds of 54mbps in the Griggs Green area on fibre which is a vast improvement.

Re: Congratulations BT/Openreach - lac (21st Jan 2018 - 11:57:47) Several neighbours report good speeds in the 50-60mbs range. In addition 4G on the O2 and EE networks (don't know about Vodafone) is also good in Griggs Green area. Several years after the rest of the country, this "rural" area of Liphook has decent connectivity. However, the pressure for fibre to the home will grow and we are still stuck with Openreach as the main provider. We should all pressure our politicians to bring in true competition and ensure the fibre network to the home actually arrives in a timely manner i.e. the next few years. The rest of Europe is already moving ahead fast, as indeed is much of the rest of the developed world. How can a country which invented the railways and built a huge network in such a short time, now be lagging so far behind the rest of the world in an equally important economic development?

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