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Anonymous User
Not applicable

Cabinet At Capacity?

My NOW Broadband was due to go live on Friday 6th May. On Saturday morning it still wasn't working, so I called NOW - only to be told there was an issue (they hadn't actually told me there was... the engineer called Friday morning and said it'd be good to go in a few hours).

 

Today I've had a text to say the street cabinet is at capacity. A bit of Googling and I've found out what this means, but I can't find a rough ETA of how long it takes to get extra capacity added. How long typically does this take?

 

I also find it a little strange as I had Fibre broadband in my property with another provider until midnight on Thursday and was purely switching provider.

 

I'm now on my 3rd day off work because I don't have internet access.

 

Thanks in advance!

19 REPLIES 19
chilli2
Elite

There is a list of stop sell exchanges here :

 https://www.openreach.co.uk/cpportal/products/product-withdrawal/stop-sells-updates

(a spreadsheet download under click here for a list )

 

The big problem is how Internet connections are marketed in the UK, Fibre doesnt always mean fibre, its usually used to describe Fibre to the cabinet which used VDSL.

 One ISP did complain a whole back, however offcom decided that the description of Fibre to the cabinet then cooper could be sold as fibre as  fibre optic cable was involved somewhere in the chain.

 by the same logic good old 56k ( or 33.6k or lower) dial up could also be described as fibre.

Anyway we are where we are.

 

As for Now, there should have been a check somewhere to ensure that you could get service.

 If you had/have an active ONT in your property then you are / were on real fibre ( aka full fibre)

Jayach
Elite 3

@chilli2 wrote:

 by the same logic good old 56k ( or 33.6k or lower) dial up could also be described as fibre.

Anyway we are where we are.

 

Not really, dial-up had to be copper all the ways, the analogue signals used couldn't be digitised. They really were just squeaks and whistles.

Jayach
Elite 3

@RoyB wrote:

have an offering that has the now misleading name of Full Fibre.

 

Which it might have been, as a description rather than a product name once, but perhaps no longer is, as a description.

 


I've never seen full fibre used as a description in Now literature.

(Was going to post a picture of the Now offerings, but I'm not yet allowed to do that, so a link to the website will have to do)

https://www.nowtv.com/broadband#ib-section-section-3

 

RoyB
Legend

@Jayach 

 

Ah, true indeed. @Anonymous User said she signed up for Full Fibre from Now, with capitals, above.

 

Sorry, Now.  Fab or Super. Curiously, at the same price, too.

Set a Payment PIN on your account so that no-one but you can buy memberships on it. Check your bank accounts monthly for any other unexpected payments to Now. That way you can at least nip them in the bud, while you and Now figure out whose fault they are.
Anonymous User
Not applicable

https://www.broadbandchecker.btwholesale.com/#/ADSL/AddressHome 

 

go here and put in your address, at top where it says vdsl swipe over to the right and if the cabnet is full it will say waiting list, so it's a case of checking everyday until someone leaves and a space comes avaliable, 

Jayach
Elite 3

@Anonymous User 

I tend to recommend the telephone number checker whenever people question their speeds, I hadn't realised it could show if the cabinet was at capacity.

BT Broadband (btwholesale.com)

Anonymous User
Not applicable

Hi all,

 

Thanks for your continued responses!

 

I set up my account over the phone, which is where I asked if the service would be the same as I was receiving (full fibre) and the rep told me it would be - which is obviously not the case as it isn't a service that is offered as I've since found out.

 

I've done the Openreach check which shows VDSL A and B to both be available. I've sent a screenshot to customer service and have asked them to recheck and frustratingly they responded to say Openreach asked them to get back in touch on the 20th so they'll confirm then.

 

I feel a little in limbo because I can of course go back to BT, but they now say it will be 2 weeks to reactivate; by which time my issues may be sorted.

 

 

chilli2
Elite

I would ask for a copy of the recording they have of you - as it may be needed should they (now) try and charge an early termination fee.

 As it stands if they sold you Now as full fibre as opposed pt FTTC then this would be classed as mis selling

Anonymous User
Not applicable

what ever your choice its going to take a while unfortunately.. since joining now I've learned 2 things

1. they are slow at solving problems

2. they don't have a scooby doo about anything. their customer service is on par with virgin ( terrible) my go live was delayed by 11 days, then only worked for 3 days then off again with another issue for 3 days. since then it's been fine. when it works its fine but when it dosent it's a nightmare trying to get issues resolved 

 

 

Jayach
Elite 3

@Anonymous User wrote:

what ever your choice its going to take a while unfortunately.. since joining now I've learned 2 things

1. they are slow at solving problems

2. they don't have a scooby doo about anything. their customer service is on par with virgin ( terrible) my go live was delayed by 11 days, then only worked for 3 days then off again with another issue for 3 days. since then it's been fine. when it works its fine but when it dosent it's a nightmare trying to get issues resolved 

 


To be fair, that is true of all the lower priced ISP's (and some of the higher priced as well)