underground telephone cables but eir still using telephone poles

Andy From Sligo

Hello, I moved in December 2016 to one of a row of 4 houses that were built on 2008.

2 of my neighbours both had telephone lines put in , one in february and one around june time. both houses the eir (or is it KN networks?) engineers came out and put brand new wiring overhead from telephone polls near their house - now, heres the thing. There is a massive manhole cover with 'eircom' on the top of it - and inside is a load of telephone cables - just wondering why they had to run the cables from the poles when all this wiring is in situ is underneath the pavement outside my house?

I have signed up the other week to have a telephone line/ telephone service installed, the box complete with wiring is in a white box underneath the electricity meter cabinet and a great big black what looks like waterproof connector & there is an eircom telephone socket in the hall and I have had it all apart and its all wired up even though there has never been a phone service in the house before, this will be the first time the house will have a working telephone line. I have plugged in a telephone to the socket to see if there was any dial tone whatsoever, but there isnt, its totally dead.

But anyway as I say I have signed up for a landline and broadband service (not fibre unfortunately because its not available in our area at the moment) Now, unlike the other houses in the row of houses I havent got a wooden telephone pole opposite my house , so I am just wondering how they are going to run to line into my house? - surely they are not going to go to the expense of putting in a wooden pole directly opposite my house are they? - and I am just wondering why they are not using the connection box in the pavement for all this? - or could it be something they planned for the future and just havent wired it up at the moment to the network?

I took a picture of the box in the pavement once and whats in there - I dont know if this will throw some light on the subject.

I'm pretty intrigued about this all now, and why they would put the connections under the pavement but not use them....

ED E

The manhole may feed the poles, or it may be disused. Ducts can be blocked, or pairs in there maybe already consumed elsewhere.

We cant really give details, but the installing technician may be able to tell you. If they want a pole expect at least a few weeks of delay.

Andy From Sligo

ED E wrote: »

The manhole may feed the poles, or it may be disused. Ducts can be blocked, or pairs in there maybe already consumed elsewhere.

We cant really give details, but the installing technician may be able to tell you. If they want a pole expect at least a few weeks of delay.

ah right, thanks for your reply. That's interesting then - The wires that are in the manhole do look like they correspond from the 4 houses - but yes it dont look like there is no main pars coming into the manhole. Maybe it was just built so in the future they could do away with the poles.

It used to cost hundreds didnt it in the old days to get a pole put in for a house didnt it?

We are not paying for the connection though. A Vodafone (ADSL at home) rep called out to the house trying to sell us a broadband package but when I said to him that the house had telephone sockets but that there were no dial tone whatsover and that the house has never ever had a working telephone line he said no worries that vodafone would take care of that and get it installed and there be no cost of installation to us - so they must be swallowing the price of a pole being put up as well by eir - blimey, must be really desperate for a sale to go to all that expense, i can understand if you had a working phone line and they just wanted you to shift over to Vodafone - but to go to the cost of putting in a phone line for someone is surprising just to get business.

Ah right so that must be where the delay is then, we signed up 2 weeks ago and no sign yet of any eir/kn engineer calling out yet

punisher5112

I would say services have been laid but not been used its the same out where i am.

Boxes and trunking ducts but they haven't ran the cables needed in a lot of cases so still use poles fitted.