cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 
Matej
Mentor

Unknown broad band plan; slow wifi; Am I on fibre or copper?

Hello, 

 I am with NOW for over a year now, and I have always had slow wifi, especially at certain times, but whenever I use the NOW technical check, it shows that my speed looks good. The odd thing is that my actual wifi speed is often 10 times lower and is fluctuating a lot. I initially wanted to contact NOW support, but I let it be as it wasn't too much of a problem and I wasn't sure if the speeds are lower than advertised, but now someone from Cityconnect came knocking on my doors and said they just connected our block to fibre because the speeds in our block vere extremely poor. He said that I am on realy old copper cables and not fibre (which seems correct as apparently our block was not connected to fibre until now), and if I don't switch, my speed will only get worse as copper is a low priority compared to fibre. He also said that NOW does not provide fibre, but then I checked my broadband plan, and I am on Super Fiber!

How is it possible that I am on a super fibre broadband plan for this whole year when there was no fibre in the entire building until now, and yet the NOW technical check keeps telling me that all looks good? Can NOW connect me to the fibre they promised and should I apply for a refund? Whom should I contact for support? I don't like solving things over the phone and I couldn't find a single email address.

Any help would be much appreciated. Thak you,

Matej

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION
gavs82008
Legend 5
Legend 5

@Matej 

If your a NOW broadband customer then you’ll be on fibre. 

What NOW offer is fibre to the cabinet aka FTTC, which from the cabinet is copper to your property. 
Most providers like BT and Sky also offer is fibre to the premise aka FTTP. Where there is no copper. 

So what is being meant is that NOW don’t provide the FTTP which can provide speeds up to 900mb. Whereas FTTC can max at about 75mb if I’m not mistaken.

FYI that I do not work for NOW, just a NOW customer trying to help

View solution in original post

12 REPLIES 12
Matej
Mentor

Thank you very much for all your answers, all were really helpful!

It makes a lot more sense now. I tried to test my access line speed and it is excellent at the moment (almost 80 mbps downstream), though I am not sure how do I measure fluctuations during the day. My wifi speeds are now good as well. I will try to check it again once the connection drops again. As the sales rep from CityFibre (sorry, it was not Cityconnect, that was a mistake) said they just installed fibre to our block, I am wondering if that couldn't have actually improved my speeds as well. I don't understand how it works, but perhaps they replaced all the copper lines leading to the block with fibre, so its now only that last bit of pipeline leading to my flat that is copper? 

I am not sure what to do if the problems are really just my wifi. I live in a small flat but there are stone walls and only one socket which is in the kitchen (don't ask me why). Still, this wouldn't explain the fluctuations I think. I wonder if switching 5GHz channel from 80 to 40Mhz could help?

Jayach
Elite 3

@Matej wrote:

It makes a lot more sense now. I tried to test my access line speed and it is excellent at the moment (almost 80 mbps downstream), though I am not sure how do I measure fluctuations during the day.


The access line speed (sync speed) won't fluctuate, it will always be the same, unless the router reboots.

Anything CityFibre have done shouldn't affect your Openreach service, they are completely different suppliers.

chilli2
Elite

City fibre is what is known as an Alt-net and as such their cables etc are entirely different to openreach  and what rubs over that network will have no effect on the other

 However as with all new installations and works there is a chance that clumsy workmen could accidentally disturb something they shouldn't.