No fibre avaialable in green map area

phildin

Hi,



Apologies if this has been asked before but I've been checking the availability of fibre at my address (Ballyfermot) and according to the fibre rollout map, the area is covered (it's shaded green). Looking at the cabinets, the closest one is 250m away but according to the Eircom website, the best they can offer is 4Mb/s.


The green map suggests that they have already done whatever rollout is going to happen; does anyone know if this is the case? Is there somewhere that I can find out what the plans for fibre rollout are? I'm not an Eircom customer and it looks as if their support line requires a phone number so I can't ask Eircom that way.



Thanks,
Phil

tsue921i8wljb3

phildin wrote: »

Hi,



Apologies if this has been asked before but I've been checking the availability of fibre at my address (Ballyfermot) and according to the fibre rollout map, the area is covered (it's shaded green). Looking at the cabinets, the closest one is 250m away but according to the Eircom website, the best they can offer is 4Mb/s.


The green map suggests that they have already done whatever rollout is going to happen; does anyone know if this is the case? Is there somewhere that I can find out what the plans for fibre rollout are? I'm not an Eircom customer and it looks as if their support line requires a phone number so I can't ask Eircom that way.



Thanks,
Phil

Enter your Eircode here and post the result:

https://www.dccae.gov.ie/en-ie/communications/topics/Broadband/national-broadband-plan/high-speed-broadband-map/Pages/Interactive-Map.aspx

phildin

Thanks, here's the message:

Your premises is in an area where commercial operators are delivering or have indicated plans to deliver high speed broadband services. Depending on where you live, you may have a choice of operators offering you this service. Check with all operators offering service in your area. If you have exhausted this avenue and cannot get high speed broadband from the providers in your area, please contact us at broadband@dccae.gov.ie to let us know.

I do get 30Mb/s from Virgin Media which I assume is cable, not fibre. I'm sick of the annual price increases from VM and it would be nice to have an alternative supplier.

Phil

tsue921i8wljb3

phildin wrote: »

Thanks, here's the message:

Your premises is in an area where commercial operators are delivering or have indicated plans to deliver high speed broadband services. Depending on where you live, you may have a choice of operators offering you this service. Check with all operators offering service in your area. If you have exhausted this avenue and cannot get high speed broadband from the providers in your area, please contact us at broadband@dccae.gov.ie to let us know.

I do get 30Mb/s from Virgin Media which I assume is cable, not fibre. I'm sick of the annual price increases from VM and it would be nice to have an alternative supplier.

Phil

Unfortunately once Virgin have a service available to you at a minimum of 30Mb/s you're deemed as covered as part of the National Broadband Plan. It sounds like your phone line is directly connected to an exchange several kilometres away so you're not going to get an improvement on that.

eir have talked about rolling out an urban FTTH product but that's unlikely to start before mid 2019 and there is no guarantee when or if you would be covered.

Unfortunately it looks like Virgin is your only realistic option for now.

phildin

Thanks navi, not what I was hoping to hear but your response clarifies the issue nicely.
Phil

Marlow

Any of the providers listed here should be able to cover you, if you're in a green shaded area:

https://fibrerollout.ie/rollout-map/where-to-buy/

A green shaded area indicates VDSL, so not fibre. But Eir do advertise VDSL as eFibre, even though it's still copper to the home.

The problem with VDSL is, that the data for enabled houses is quite poor. So you might try different providers broadband checks or engage with one of them. At 250m to the nearest cabinet, you should be able to get 50 Mbit/s and up down the copper line, depending on how long the cable run is.

/M

tsue921i8wljb3

Marlow wrote: »

Any of the providers listed here should be able to cover you, if you're in a green shaded area:

https://fibrerollout.ie/rollout-map/where-to-buy/

A green shaded area indicates VDSL, so not fibre. But Eir do advertise VDSL as eFibre, even though it's still copper to the home.

The problem with VDSL is, that the data for enabled houses is quite poor. So you might try different providers broadband checks or engage with one of them. At 250m to the nearest cabinet, you should be able to get 50 Mbit/s and up down the copper line, depending on how long the cable run is.

/M

Your advice is somewhat disingenuous. Just because he is within 250m of a cabinet there is no guarantee that he will be able to connect to it. What if it is on the other side of a road? Are open eir going to organise road opening licenses and traffic management to move his line?

Marlow

Marlowe Dazzling Region wrote: »

Your advice is somewhat disingenuous. Just because he is within 250m of a cabinet there is no guarantee that he will be able to connect to it. What if it is on the other side of a road? Are open eir going to organise road opening licenses and traffic management to move his line?

If the provider orders a new line, they will pull a new line. Yes. Assuming, there's ports available in the cab. Again, you don't find out for certain, until you order, due to the poor data available for VDSL.

/M

tsue921i8wljb3

Marlow wrote: »

If the provider orders a new line, they will pull a new line. Yes. Assuming, there's ports available in the cab. Again, you don't find out for certain, until you order, due to the poor data available for VDSL.

/M

They'll stop traffic and dig up the roads in Ballyfermot to connect one customer?

Marlow

Marlowe Dazzling Region wrote: »

They'll stop traffic and dig up the roads in Ballyfermot to connect one customer?

No. They will probably connect to whatever cabinet is available through ducting.

But your assumption is based on that the data available is accurate, which it is not.

Why do you assume, that here is no ducting in place between a cabinet (doesn't have to be that one) and that premise by default ?

Where most fail to migrate to VDSL is because they try to migrate their existing line. If you order a VDSL only line from a provider, a new line will be brought in, in most cases. And that's VDSL capable then.

/M

tsue921i8wljb3

Marlow wrote: »

No. They will probably connect to whatever cabinet is available through ducting.

But your assumption is based on that the data available is accurate, which it is not.

Why do you assume, that here is no ducting in place between a cabinet (doesn't have to be that one) and that premise by default ?

Where most fail to migrate to VDSL is because they try to migrate their existing line. If you order a VDSL only line from a provider, a new line will be brought in, in most cases. And that's VDSL capable then.

/M

OK.

phildin if you go down this route I'd appreciate if you could post back here with the outcome.

ED E

Marlow wrote: »

Where most fail to migrate to VDSL is because they try to migrate their existing line. If you order a VDSL only line from a provider, a new line will be brought in, in most cases. And that's VDSL capable then.

Can't agree there M.

If an FST is sent out on NLP its up to him and his CTM to decide how that metallic path is constructed. Sometimes you could induce them to run the desired direction by requesting a second line or getting a nice and helpful FST but with nearly all this work going to KNN now and them pushing techs to deadlines 19 times in 20 its the fastest route that will be taken - even if that includes using a raggedy old drop that will error like a b1tch.

Not saying it doesnt happen, but don't believe its most cases for one second.

Marlow

ED E wrote: »

Not saying it doesnt happen, but don't believe its most cases for one second.

The issue is, that in a lot of cases, the old line, that's in place is patched all the way back to the exchange, when slow speeds are reported on tests.

However, when a new line is ordered, it gets patched to the cab instead. There are a lot of lines on top of that, that come back "manual migration needed", that are in the APQ. Same story here.

And yes, they don't always go to the nearest cab in an urban environment. But most urban eircodes are in reach of 6, maybe 10 vdsl cabinets within 500m.

/M

tsue921i8wljb3

Marlow you should get onto the Department and tell them you've solved one of their major headaches. All these 84500 premises (June 2018 figure, likely higher now) need to do is order a new line!

Marlow

Marlowe Dazzling Region wrote: »

Marlow you should get onto the Department and tell them you've solved one of their major headaches. All these 84500 premises (June 2018 figure, likely higher now) need to do is order a new line!

I'm not saying, that it works for every premise. But it works for a lot of premises, that fail the test.

You can either continue to tell people, that you can't have it or you can at least make the attempt to get a connection.

Are you aware of how many cases of just bad database prevent people from getting VDSL ? Are you aware of how often this can be fixed ?

With your approach, it won't even get attempted.

The op on this thread is in a green area. The DCCAE map shows him in a commercially covered area. In that case, it's a very high chance to fix the situation. Why the hostile approach ?

/M

Marlow

Also, just to give an idea of how bad things are:

There are currently 1.55M premises listed for VDSL / FTTC, of those only 1M are known by eircode.

Of those 1M, a lot of eircodes are matched wrongly. At least 10%.

And then there's all the premises, that have not been listed, but yet actually can avail of VDSL. I come across a few of those every week. And apart from very extreme cases, they generally can be enabled, if they're in a green area as per fibrerollout.ie and considered commercially covered by the DCCAE.

It's a manual process, but it can be done.

/M

tsue921i8wljb3

Marlow wrote: »

I'm not saying, that it works for every premise. But it works for a lot of premises, that fail the test.

You can either continue to tell people, that you can't have it or you can at least make the attempt to get a connection.

Are you aware of how many cases of just bad database prevent people from getting VDSL ? Are you aware of how often this can be fixed ?

With your approach, it won't even get attempted.

The op on this thread is in a green area. The DCCAE map shows him in a commercially covered area. In that case, it's a very high chance to fix the situation. Why the hostile approach ?

/M

Because I believe you are overselling the frequency of this happening. I'd agree with ED E that this is the exception rather than the rule.

Any of the providers listed here should be able to cover you, if you're in a green shaded area:

For example this is plain wrong. Compare the fibrerolout map of Westport with the third image in my previous post, or the NBP map. open eir never updated their maps to reflect the reality that those amber dots can not get service. The have told the Department that they will not be covered commercially, so being shaded in green means nothing really.

The OP's home would likely have an amber dot were he not covered by Virgin.

I'll happily eat my words if you manage to get him connected.

Marlow

Marlowe Dazzling Region wrote: »

For example this is plain wrong. Compare the fibrerolout map of Westport with the third image in my previous post, or the NBP map. open eir never updated their maps to reflect the reality that those amber dots can not get service. The have told the Department that they will not be covered commercially, so being shaded in green means nothing really.

Hence why I specificly said, that he needs to be covered by both maps.

/M

tsue921i8wljb3

Marlow wrote: »

Hence why I specificly said, that he needs to be covered by both maps.

/M

What?

Marlow

Marlowe Dazzling Region wrote: »

What?

Marlow wrote: »

The op on this thread is in a green area. The DCCAE map shows him in a commercially covered area. In that case, it's a very high chance to fix the situation.

And I responded in the same post, that the approach I outlined obviously doesn't apply to all. But 84k homes out of 1.6M+ is a small percentage.

/M

tsue921i8wljb3

Marlow wrote: »

/M

As I said how do you know that all that is preventing him being an amber dot is the fact that his home is passed by Virgin?

All those dots in Westport were in a "commercially covered area" at one stage.

Marlow

Marlowe Dazzling Region wrote: »

As I said how do you know that all that is preventing him being an amber dot is the fact that his home is passed by Virgin?

All those dots in Westport were in a "commercially covered area" at one stage.

I don't, until I specificly ask OpenEir for that specific premise. But if I don't make the attempt to do so, I leave over 500k premises out, that may or may not have an active phone line or ever had a phone line.

Include 84k potential fails and deal with them as you come across them ? Or leave over 500k premises out because the database is in such a bad shape, that you can't reliably identify them based on the data that you are presented with ?

So far, nearly every premise that fell into that scope has been connected. And often with reasonable speeds.

/M

tsue921i8wljb3

Marlow wrote: »

I don't, until I specificly ask OpenEir for that specific premise. But if I don't make the attempt to do so, I leave over 500k premises out, that may or may not have an active phone line or ever had a phone line.

Include 84k potential fails and deal with them as you come across them ? Or leave over 500k premises out because the database is in such a bad shape, that you can't reliably identify them based on the data that you are presented with ?

So far, nearly every premise that fell into that scope has been connected. And often with reasonable speeds.

/M

As I said I'm happy to be proven wrong if you get him connected. I hope the OP posts back here if he does.

phildin

I'll certainly give it a go and post back with anything I hear back. I suspect the main challenge will be getting past customer service who will want to tell me that the existing phone line is all I can get.
Thanks,
Phil

BionicRasher

Jumping in here if you dont mind
I have been invited to attend a local community meeting in my area to discuss this very issue.

We are in a green shaded area (blue on the Government interactive map) and you would think we could get Fibre. However there are well over 150 houses/business premises that cant get it and the best we can get offered is a poor (ADSL I presume) 20Mbps connection (in real life at 8pm in the evening its down to less than 1Mbps)
As One example my parents house is 890m to the nearest cabinet (as the crow flies) but thats 2.9km by main road so I doubt they are ever going to be served by that cabinet.

We are holding a meeting tomorrow to discuss next actions to see what can be done as ever time any household calls a service provider to enable fibre they get fobbed off with 'oh sorry Fibre is not enabled on your line yet...but its due soon.....'
Looking for a few pointers on what can be done as we have gone down the route of telling the local TD (he doesn't give toss) We have tried getting lots of people to call Eir to get enabled thinking the demand might jolt something in to action. The households are very frustrated now as many need Broadband for small businesses etc and its a pain having to deal with the awful connection. The area is in a large town in County Cork and in this day and age you would think they could get it sorted

Should we look to ask all these households to order a new line? Will this cost extra to the customer?

tsue921i8wljb3

BionicRasher wrote: »

Jumping in here if you dont mind
I have been invited to attend a local community meeting in my area to discuss this very issue.

We are in a green shaded area (blue on the Government interactive map) and you would think we could get Fibre. However there are well over 150 houses/business premises that cant get it and the best we can get offered is a poor (ADSL I presume) 20Mbps connection (in real life at 8pm in the evening its down to less than 1Mbps)
As One example my parents house is 890m to the nearest cabinet (as the crow flies) but thats 2.9km by main road so I doubt they are ever going to be served by that cabinet.

We are holding a meeting tomorrow to discuss next actions to see what can be done as ever time any household calls a service provider to enable fibre they get fobbed off with 'oh sorry Fibre is not enabled on your line yet...but its due soon.....'
Looking for a few pointers on what can be done as we have gone down the route of telling the local TD (he doesn't give toss) We have tried getting lots of people to call Eir to get enabled thinking the demand might jolt something in to action. The households are very frustrated now as many need Broadband for small businesses etc and its a pain having to deal with the awful connection. The area is in a large town in County Cork and in this day and age you would think they could get it sorted

Should we look to ask all these households to order a new line? Will this cost extra to the customer?

If the homes are getting sub 30Mb they should not be blue on the NBP map. The Department should be contacted and informed that the map needs amending.

Marlow will be able to give you more advice about ordering lines.

Marlow

BionicRasher wrote: »

Should we look to ask all these households to order a new line? Will this cost extra to the customer?

If you're more than 500m (as the crow flies) from a VDSL cabinet, then even a new line won't fix the issue.

The scenario I'm talking about is:
- you're within 500m or nearer to a cabinet
- you're within a green shaded area
- you're down as being commercially covered by the DCCAE map

Lots of homes and business like that who fail.

Your first approach would be to talk to the department. The TD can't do a thing about your situation. Eircom/Eir/OpenEIR is a private company. And they only have an obligation (USO) in regards to phone lines. Not broadband.

/M