Stuck with useless Fibrenest internet on Persimmon estate

Rufff

Da_Crojanz said:

Does anyone who owns a Persimmon new build know how long it takes for Virgin, BT etc to become available on developments?

When we bought the home 6 months ago we had to sign up to their crappy Fibrenest internet service. It works ok but the box is hideous and it’s about £10 a month overpriced. We were told that within a year or 2 other options would be available.

Has anyone experienced this and how long did it take?

Hey OP,
I feel your pain, been on a persimmon development over a year, and also left no choice but FibreNest.

As another poster said, the price is actually quite reasonable for the speeds they offer, I agree and I’m really happy tbh (at the moment), but long term I would prefer a full choice of providers. 

You’re right, in that the equipment they provide is total utter garbage. It’s some Huawei plastic tacky rubbish - I think the free toys in kids Happy Meals are better quality!

Unfortunately there is no “exclusivity” period with them. The persimmon sales people have no bloody clue. They’ll promise you next weeks lottery numbers if it means you putting down a reservation fee on a house. It’s ultimately down to when another provider (be it BT, Virgin Media, HyperOptic etc) obtain a wayleave to install their own equipment from the site/land owner. I’m not a legal expert but I understand BT has statutory powers to force landowners into wayleave agreements in limited circumstances, but I’ve not seen or heard of them doing this on new build developments.

FibreNest use a weird (cheap and nasty) huawei “passive” fibre optic solution for their network. So I also don’t believe BT will adopt these straight from FibreNest, as they use a different “active optical” tech.

If you’re technically minded, you can reverse engineer their cruddy huawei box. I’ve done so and replaced it with a Ubiquiti branded ONU & router - happy as Larry now 👏👏

iniltous

As already said, when the roads and footpaths become the council’s responsibility ( when they adopt them ) then any provider with the appropriate accreditation under the NRSWA 1991 will have the ‘right’ to install equipment in the roads and foothpaths, they don’t need ‘permission’....until the council adopt the roads/paths , these areas belong to the developer who is linked to the incumbent FTTP provider so they are unlikely to grant permission, even if it were sought....as far as compulsory wayleaves to force them to accept someone else’s network, that never going to happen given the council will typically  adopt the roads etc, a couple of years after the site is finished anyway....chances are by the time any legal case has run its course , access would be available anyway.

Rufff

iniltous said:

As already said, when the roads and footpaths become the council’s responsibility ( when they adopt them ) then any provider with the appropriate accreditation under the NRSWA 1991 will have the ‘right’ to install equipment in the roads and foothpaths, they don’t need ‘permission’....until the council adopt the roads/paths , these areas belong to the developer who is linked to the incumbent FTTP provider so they are unlikely to grant permission, even if it were sought....as far as compulsory wayleaves to force them to accept someone else’s network, that never going to happen given the council will typically  adopt the roads etc, a couple of years after the site is finished anyway....chances are by the time any legal case has run its course , access would be available anyway.

You have to hope the council want to adopt.
Some show zero interest in adopting new roads, as it allows them to “double-dip” in terms of funding; they can still charge homeowners council tax, but offload street maintenance liabilities on to developer (or holding company they’ve offloaded the roads onto).

Happened at my old address, Bucks’ Council have no intention of adopting as it’s a lose-lose for them in terms of money. 

The Developer offloaded the land onto to some obscure holding company. New owners of our old home have just been served an enormous maintenance bill for their share of resurfacing the site. Rip

Nortodd

Absolute nightmare when combined with a very weak mobile signal. The Fibrenest router doesn’t reach further than the living room where it is placed by Persimmon. After one week in our new home we have completely ineffective internet and useless mobile communications. I have to get in the car and travel outside the village to make a voice call. The router doesn’t like playing with the Wi-fi extender either! It’s like living in the dark ages!

JJ_Egan

Run an Ethernet cable  .

Mobile check networks for best coverage .

But as its new i would be complaining to the developer/ builder .

Richard_T_

If your in an area that offerss access to a wimax provider then that is one option.

 another is using a mobile phone network, as far as i know EE offer one, 200GB usage/month for £40

and three offer one http://www.three.co.uk/store/broadband/home-broadband

 with three appearing to be the cheapest with unlimited usage for £22/month

Tokmon

Nortodd said:

Absolute nightmare when combined with a very weak mobile signal. The Fibrenest router doesn’t reach further than the living room where it is placed by Persimmon. After one week in our new home we have completely ineffective internet and useless mobile communications. I have to get in the car and travel outside the village to make a voice call. The router doesn’t like playing with the Wi-fi extender either! It’s like living in the dark ages!

Well you should have known about the weak mobile signal before you moved there and this can be sorted by changing to a phone/network that offers Wi-Fi calling.

Your Wi-Fi issue can easily be sorted by purchasing an additional router or wireless access points and correctly setting it up so you have coverage across your home.

aebade1986

Rufff said:

Da_Crojanz said:

Does anyone who owns a Persimmon new build know how long it takes for Virgin, BT etc to become available on developments?

When we bought the home 6 months ago we had to sign up to their crappy Fibrenest internet service. It works ok but the box is hideous and it’s about £10 a month overpriced. We were told that within a year or 2 other options would be available.

Has anyone experienced this and how long did it take?

Hey OP,
I feel your pain, been on a persimmon development over a year, and also left no choice but FibreNest.

As another poster said, the price is actually quite reasonable for the speeds they offer, I agree and I’m really happy tbh (at the moment), but long term I would prefer a full choice of providers. 

You’re right, in that the equipment they provide is total utter garbage. It’s some Huawei plastic tacky rubbish - I think the free toys in kids Happy Meals are better quality!

Unfortunately there is no “exclusivity” period with them. The persimmon sales people have no bloody clue. They’ll promise you next weeks lottery numbers if it means you putting down a reservation fee on a house. It’s ultimately down to when another provider (be it BT, Virgin Media, HyperOptic etc) obtain a wayleave to install their own equipment from the site/land owner. I’m not a legal expert but I understand BT has statutory powers to force landowners into wayleave agreements in limited circumstances, but I’ve not seen or heard of them doing this on new build developments.

FibreNest use a weird (cheap and nasty) huawei “passive” fibre optic solution for their network. So I also don’t believe BT will adopt these straight from FibreNest, as they use a different “active optical” tech.

If you’re technically minded, you can reverse engineer their cruddy huawei box. I’ve done so and replaced it with a Ubiquiti branded ONU & router - happy as Larry now 👏👏

Hi Ruff, need you help configuring the Ubiquiti ONU, can I send you a PM?