No Phone Lines - what to do?

appalledandhelpless

Hi All,

Now then, i have recently purchased a new build property of which the developer has neglected to install any wiring for phone lines. There is no underground trunking available and he has indicated that he will not be installing any either. According to the developer BT are wanting £46000 to install cabling to the 11 properties on site and he has no intentions of paying them for it. This leaves us up the preverbial creek with out a paddle.

In this day and age it is ridiculous to not have a phone line installed at a property (infact i hope one day it's illegal to not have) but i really don't know which way to turn now.

We are not in a Virgin Media area, BT won't install any lines without huge cost, what other options are there?

PS - Mobile internet is not an option as we live in a 400 year old pub converted to 5 houses and mobile reception is lousy. There are also 6 apartments built across from the old pub building in what would have been the car park. So we are contained within gated grounds.

Gordon_Hose

Satellite broadband. Pricey though.

Im_just_careful

You may just be stuck but I would guess that there is a bit more to this than meets the eye.

Is it a rural area with no surrounding telephone infrastructure ?

BT would do quite a lot of work for £46,000.

Do surrounding households have small dishes on their buildings suggesting some sort of microwave based telephones/Internet ?

Buzby

Sounds that quote is for a full underground drop to all the properties. Regardless of this BT has a universal service obligation, and they cannot unreasonably state they will not provide service. This would be a cheaper provision, with poles feeding the properties - assuming this is adjacent to a public road and not a private wayleave route.

I would expect if all owners synchronised their orders for telephone service, Openreach would arrange it for the standard (full) installation charge.

Im_just_careful

One other thought, is ALL mobile network reception poor or just the one you use ?

Coverage differs.

What does Sitefinder show for your area ?

iniltous

Not sure your developer is telling the truth here, BT , unless things have changed recently, actually pay the developer to install BT's kit, over 10 years ago it was around £250 per tenancy, for this the developer would by given all the ducting ( grey plastic underground pipe) and plans where to build the joint boxes etc..,they would then install the ducts for BT, who would cable these ducts and connect lines back to the exchange, so delevopment of 50 houses, BT pay £12500.
As the delevoper owns the land, they can refuse BT access , if they do this, BT has to wait until the roads and footpaths are adopted by the local council, they then have the right to install their line plant under the an act of parliament NRSWA , but they tend to go for a cheap fix, as digging up roads and paths is expensive, they put in poles and serve the properties overhead.
Most developers that are NHBC members, allow BT in, infact the rate that BT pay is negotiated with the NHBC and not individual developers

appalledandhelpless

Thanks all for your replies.

To answer a few, we are not in a rural area we are slap bang in the middle of a well established estate. Problem is we are isolated from the estate being on private land behind gates etc.

With regards to 3G i have been with Orange/T-Mobile and Vodafone both have been terrible. My wife is on O2 which is better but still terrible (she can only get reception in the spare bedroom) and my Mum is on 3, when she visits its no better than the rest. So i would say that list is pretty much exhausted. Big Stone walls are the problem i think.

I had heard BT pay the developer for installation but that contradicted what i'd been told by the developer. Being new to all this i have no idea what to believe. Maybe i should contact BT and grovel, see if that works.

[Deleted User]

I wouldn't buy a property off this developer then. What else is he skimping on? Makes you wonder.