City Fibre

Soldato
Joined
7 Jul 2004
Posts
7,784
Location
Gloucester
My router is dual wan so I'll be finding the cheapest (probably slow) fibre deal with openreach and maintain that as a backup for the 1st year until I'm comfortable that CityFibre is stable
 
Soldato
Joined
14 Apr 2014
Posts
6,651
Location
Sunny Sussex
Haven’t noticed any changes to my No One internet sub.

I raised my concerns with the No One MD, who advised that while the support was being moved to Home Telecom, Lisa and her team (who have been the superstars) are also moving across, so will still be supporting No One.
 
Soldato
Joined
27 Feb 2015
Posts
12,621
Going to post my experience here, as I see CityFbire getting hyped up a lot as if they some sort of revolutionary company but my experience is pretty bad.

So I live in a ground floor flat that has no shared communal area, BT, Virgin Media both treat it as an SDU as I believe it to be. Official council records state it is an SDU.

For a long time the property on the CF checker was marked as not available due to needing wayleave approval from landlord. This finally changed in February of this year. I was able to place an order.

However I then noticed many ISP's (typically the more well known one's) had the property as unavailable.

This included Vodafone and Zen.

On the isp's it was available it had an exact 4 month wait, whilst the house next door had about 2-3 weeks lead time.

AAISP also informed me of a 4 month wait. They were initially confused and it took them 3 weeks to even submit the order against my instructions which didnt help matters.

Vodafone I filled in a complaints form and they rang me up, they explained any address that has over a 3 month lead time they wont serve the property as they wont put their customers through that process. I now understand what they mean by that.

As it turns out its not just a basic 4 month delay, the order isnt even a committed order. Its a best case scenario.

So it seems their current policy for MDUs is to have a 4 month lead time on order, during this time they will send permission to work forms to the property owner (instead of legal occupier like it is on SDU) and the 4 months is based on that on average they get approval within 4 months. My issue is of course what happens if they dont get approval, its obvious in that situation the install date doesnt mean anything.

What CF want to do is get permission from my landlord to install in all 3 flats he owns, no shared communal area, everyone own ground floor entrance. The other 2 tenants have no interest in the service, my landlord told me no problem installing in mine, but he isnt agreeing to the others, I didnt argue as I think CF are being totally unreasonable, he sent a reply to CF asking them to send a new form just for my flat which he will sign, they also need to remove the waive of liability (which I also think is reasonable). They have not replied to him, just a stonewall.

I then emailed the CEO of CF, and got a response after 2 hours from their exec team. My email was along the lines of the property needs reclassifying as an SDU, they can send a surveyor, they can look at public council records, and they can accept my statement as legal occupier, I also offered photos and other proof.

Their response was actually reasonable, they are open to changing it to an SDU on their systems, and sending a surveyor, they asked for details of how to check council records (this made me think wtf, shouldnt this be routine?) and the photos. I replied with "all" of what they asked for.

Since then nothing, the same stonewall my landlord has got. AAISP themselves seem to have some kind of loyalty to CF and dont want to go against what their CF rep says. The rep is trying to brute force the MDU installation presumably so its easier to get 2 other flats signed up with the works completed.

I have given CF 2 weeks from the date my email was sent, as I see it as a mess with no promise of anything, I reminded the CEO of course, he has a problem with low takeup, and these MDU processes are clearly a problem, but sadly even their exec team seems stuck.

Its really weird because any other telco I have dealt with, be it BT, Virgin Media or whatever, the communication is nowhere near this bad, especially once you escalate to the CEO level.

The reason for the time limit I imposed is my Virgin Media contract ends on 28 April, if I dont renew, my monthly cost triples. I also assume any retention deals currently offered to me have an expiry on them. Also the VM service is actually really good, despite all the moaners on the internet, I cant fault the performance, and the reliability is miles ahead of any recent DSL ISPs I have used. To be blunt it just works, so the most likely outcome now is that in about a week from this post I will agree a retention deal with VM and cancel the CF order.

Thought I would post this as its clear there is problems, particurly on the MDU side of things, and I am not alone, I see other MDU occupiers posting about similar issues, with no interest from the press to pick up on it.
 
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Soldato
Joined
29 Dec 2002
Posts
7,262
TLDR: My landlord wont sign the wayleave form without changes made that City Fibre can’t/wont accept, and I will stay with Virgin.

Going to post my experience here, as I see CityFbire getting hyped up a lot as if they some sort of revolutionary company but my experience is pretty bad.

So I live in a ground floor flat that has no shared communal area, BT, Virgin Media both treat it as an SDU as I believe it to be. Official council records state it is an SDU.

For a long time the property on the CF checker was marked as not available due to needing wayleave approval from landlord. This finally changed in February of this year. I was able to place an order.

However I then noticed many ISP's (typically the more well known one's) had the property as unavailable.

This included Vodafone and Zen.

On the isp's it was available it had an exact 4 month wait, whilst the house next door had about 2-3 weeks lead time.

AAISP also informed me of a 4 month wait. They were initially confused and it took them 3 weeks to even submit the order against my instructions which didnt help matters.

Vodafone I filled in a complaints form and they rang me up, they explained any address that has over a 3 month lead time they wont serve the property as they wont put their customers through that process. I now understand what they mean by that.

As it turns out its not just a basic 4 month delay, the order isnt even a committed order. Its a best case scenario.

So it seems their current policy for MDUs is to have a 4 month lead time on order, during this time they will send permission to work forms to the property owner (instead of legal occupier like it is on SDU) and the 4 months is based on that on average they get approval within 4 months. My issue is of course what happens if they dont get approval, its obvious in that situation the install date doesnt mean anything.

What CF want to do is get permission from my landlord to install in all 3 flats he owns, no shared communal area, everyone own ground floor entrance. The other 2 tenants have no interest in the service, my landlord told me no problem installing in mine, but he isnt agreeing to the others, I didnt argue as I think CF are being totally unreasonable, he sent a reply to CF asking them to send a new form just for my flat which he will sign, they also need to remove the waive of liability (which I also think is reasonable). They have not replied to him, just a stonewall.

I then emailed the CEO of CF, and got a response after 2 hours from their exec team. My email was along the lines of the property needs reclassifying as an SDU, they can send a surveyor, they can look at public council records, and they can accept my statement as legal occupier, I also offered photos and other proof.

Their response was actually reasonable, they are open to changing it to an SDU on their systems, and sending a surveyor, they asked for details of how to check council records (this made me think wtf, shouldnt this be routine?) and the photos. I replied with "all" of what they asked for.

Since then nothing, the same stonewall my landlord has got. AAISP themselves seem to have some kind of loyalty to CF and dont want to go against what their CF rep says. The rep is trying to brute force the MDU installation presumably so its easier to get 2 other flats signed up with the works completed.

I have given CF 2 weeks from the date my email was sent, as I see it as a mess with no promise of anything, I reminded the CEO of course, he has a problem with low takeup, and these MDU processes are clearly a problem, but sadly even their exec team seems stuck.

Its really weird because any other telco I have dealt with, be it BT, Virgin Media or whatever, the communication is nowhere near this bad, especially once you escalate to the CEO level.

The reason for the time limit I imposed is my Virgin Media contract ends on 28 April, if I dont renew, my monthly cost triples. I also assume any retention deals currently offered to me have an expiry on them. Also the VM service is actually really good, despite all the moaners on the internet, I cant fault the performance, and the reliability is miles ahead of any recent DSL ISPs I have used. To be blunt it just works, so the most likely outcome now is that in about a week from this post I will agree a retention deal with VM and cancel the CF order.

Thought I would post this as its clear there is problems, particurly on the MDU side of things, and I am not alone, I see other MDU occupiers posting about similar issues, with no interest from the press to pick up on it.

Waylewve is a legal requirement, the odds that CF or any provider will vary the agreement clauses is near zero and the whole process can take less than a week, but you wont get an actual install date till they have a signed waylewve from the LL and they have surveyed it. They also may not want to add you unless they can RFS the other properties at the same time which is why it wasnt done initially.
 
Soldato
Joined
27 Feb 2015
Posts
12,621
TLDR: My landlord wont sign the wayleave form without changes made that City Fibre can’t/wont accept, and I will stay with Virgin.



Waylewve is a legal requirement, the odds that CF or any provider will vary the agreement clauses is near zero and the whole process can take less than a week, but you wont get an actual install date till they have a signed waylewve from the LL and they have surveyed it. They also may not want to add you unless they can RFS the other properties at the same time which is why it wasnt done initially.
Then they lose a customer, me and the LL are in agreement, its either just my flat or nothing.

Its also should probably be a SDU on their records, CF classified it lazily, without no surveyor or anything.

Bear in mind this so called legal requirement isnt adhered to for SDU's hence their short install periods.

They have given me an install date, but like I said in my post its obviously not going to happen without their process going through, but on their current processes they do now it seems allow some orders to be submitted without a wayleave agreement, they just have this 4 month delay with a pending date.
 
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Soldato
Joined
29 Dec 2002
Posts
7,262
Then they lose a customer, me and the LL are in agreement, its either just my flat or nothing.

Its also should probably be a SDU on their records, CF classified it lazily, without no surveyor or anything.

Bear in mind this so called legal requirement isnt adhered to for SDU's hence their short install periods.

They have given me an install date, but like I said in my post its obviously not going to happen without their process going through, but on their current processes they do now it seems allow some orders to be submitted without a wayleave agreement, they just have this 4 month delay with a pending date.
They haven’t lost a customer, you’re not a customer, merely a potential customer enquiring about service that they may or may not wish to make available to you. In business terms you’re an expense that could be divided among making three properties RFS or one, you might get away with a single property, but I would be amazed if they vary the standard wayleave terms for you, that just isn’t done for cases like this as it creates a nightmare down the line and is likely an insurance requirement.

I used to deal with waylewve reporting and process issues for VM, the Housefiles team that deal with releasing properties as serviceable on our database were lovely, less so the original wayleave team, but they were made redundant when the process was overhauled, but they were absolutely inflexible because that was the job requirement. In most cases they obtain bulk waylewve from a council/HA or developer, in other cases it was done door to door as part of laying the cable decades earlier, but each change from ‘Wayleave required’ to ‘Servicable’ required a member of staff to pull the digital records and manually confirm them. If nothing was on file or the landlord returned forms with sections crossed out etc. it was rejected because it simply wasn't an option. All CF have done is amended the database so you can request waylewve with a 4 month lead time before they cancel, they wont install without it, not should they.

Also this isn’t a bad experience, I can tell you about bad experiences and what happens when it goes wrong and how much it costs, this is not that.
 
Soldato
Joined
16 Oct 2005
Posts
4,063
Location
UK
Prospective customer here, looking for any advice from existing/previous customers.

I currently have FTTC with PlusNet and am paying almost £55 a month! Getting 50-75Mbsps down. (PlusNet offer a new FTTC contract at £26).

CityFibre has been available in my area for a while so I'm looking for a speed boost and a saving on my current payments at least and to drop my phone line.

From doing some reading I'm looking at going with iDNet as they seem to be a good provider with strong support, and good latency, and static IPs.
Their 500Mbps package at £39 a month for 12 months which is a bit more than I was hoping to pay but I'm convincing myself it is worth it for a good ISP. I'll need to get the hardware installed and use my current router; TPLink Archer AX50/AX3000 that has Gigabit/Wifi6.

In order to ensure I can be home when the install gets arranged I've got a week or so before ordering so thought I'd ask if there's any other provider worth considering.
Reliable service, good latency, fast speed, decent support. For gaming, speedier downloading, watching content.

I'm also wondering if people find 100/150Mbps enough for one person using it. I'm feeling like 500Mbps might be a bit of a novelty for 12months and then 'downgrade' to a 150Mbps package.

I have a big range of available CityFibre ISPs; iDNet, Vodafone, Zen, Link, Rocket, Brillband, Fibrehop, BrawBand. [A&A*, FusionFibre*, Yayzi*, Gigabit*, Octaplus*, No One*, TalkTalk*]. * ones I've already decided to avoid for various reasons price/service.

Thanks.
 
Soldato
Joined
7 Jun 2020
Posts
3,116
Location
-
@bsoltan Haven't been with IDNet personally but heard they're pretty good, think they're the best choice for you given the need for a static IP, latency etc.
150Mbps is definitely enough & won't be noticeable to having 900Mbps+ unless you're doing large downloads quite often or don't want to wait when you do

Vodafone is a big no no for the time being (been like this for ~3+ yrs now) as they have a lot of routing issues where you get put onto the wrong BNG and latency is way higher than it should be.
Would be great if they fixed these issues as they have the most competitive pricing & great latency otherwise. Lot of other ISPs you mentioned are quite small and don't have their own peering so would probably stay away from those

Personally am with TalkTalk, but they don't offer static IP's, have price increases, mid support etc, but don't mind paying the premium as latency/uptime is great and prefer the dynamic IP
 
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Soldato
Joined
27 Feb 2015
Posts
12,621
They haven’t lost a customer, you’re not a customer, merely a potential customer enquiring about service that they may or may not wish to make available to you. In business terms you’re an expense that could be divided among making three properties RFS or one, you might get away with a single property, but I would be amazed if they vary the standard wayleave terms for you, that just isn’t done for cases like this as it creates a nightmare down the line and is likely an insurance requirement.

I used to deal with waylewve reporting and process issues for VM, the Housefiles team that deal with releasing properties as serviceable on our database were lovely, less so the original wayleave team, but they were made redundant when the process was overhauled, but they were absolutely inflexible because that was the job requirement. In most cases they obtain bulk waylewve from a council/HA or developer, in other cases it was done door to door as part of laying the cable decades earlier, but each change from ‘Wayleave required’ to ‘Servicable’ required a member of staff to pull the digital records and manually confirm them. If nothing was on file or the landlord returned forms with sections crossed out etc. it was rejected because it simply wasn't an option. All CF have done is amended the database so you can request waylewve with a 4 month lead time before they cancel, they wont install without it, not should they.

Also this isn’t a bad experience, I can tell you about bad experiences and what happens when it goes wrong and how much it costs, this is not that.
So why is there no requirement to have houses all connect all at once or none at all? this business expense, they not telling someone in a semi detached, if your neighbours dont sign up we not connecting you. What you havent explained is why houses dont have the same process (I expect the answer is because of the proximity and communal areas, which I explained to you is not the case with my property), the house next door to me is rented, legal occupier isnt the owner, the work to install in both properties is the same, we have the same room placements and same front door location, the only difference is I have a flat in my address.

There is examples of combined SDU/MDU buildings where people without their own front door are stuck, but those with their own front door have managed to get a CF install just in their property, so these deviations have happened.

Also BT didnt go through this process to connect my property.

I am not even arguing with you on the process ending up with a cancelled order, I did state in my original comment on this I dont expect the order to go through without intervention. My point is the process needs improving, not that I believe the process to be incorrect. The part I think is incorrect is they have misclassified the property as they never did a survey, they have just assumed with a flat as part of the address it is an MDU.
 
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Soldato
Joined
27 Feb 2015
Posts
12,621
They haven’t lost a customer, you’re not a customer, merely a potential customer enquiring about service that they may or may not wish to make available to you. In business terms you’re an expense that could be divided among making three properties RFS or one, you might get away with a single property, but I would be amazed if they vary the standard wayleave terms for you, that just isn’t done for cases like this as it creates a nightmare down the line and is likely an insurance requirement.

I used to deal with waylewve reporting and process issues for VM, the Housefiles team that deal with releasing properties as serviceable on our database were lovely, less so the original wayleave team, but they were made redundant when the process was overhauled, but they were absolutely inflexible because that was the job requirement. In most cases they obtain bulk waylewve from a council/HA or developer, in other cases it was done door to door as part of laying the cable decades earlier, but each change from ‘Wayleave required’ to ‘Servicable’ required a member of staff to pull the digital records and manually confirm them. If nothing was on file or the landlord returned forms with sections crossed out etc. it was rejected because it simply wasn't an option. All CF have done is amended the database so you can request waylewve with a 4 month lead time before they cancel, they wont install without it, not should they.

Also this isn’t a bad experience, I can tell you about bad experiences and what happens when it goes wrong and how much it costs, this is not that.

Some more for you to think about here. As I think you have made assumptions about my property, considering you mentioned HA's.

1 - CF allow legal occupier to approve works in rented houses.
2 - CF have chosen to stop communicating which is a form of passive aggression, when it seems they have something awkward to deal with, you said you found no problem with the way they handling this. For me choosing to not communicate is a problem and not professional, as an example if you turned down for a loan, the bank tells you, it doesnt simply not respond.
3 - CF have made no attempt to explain anything they required to do by law.
4 - CF have told me they thought I was living in an apartment block.
5 - My flat is like a small terraced house, there is no shared area's and structurally its the same neighbours on terraced housing, the other 2 flats are basically just an expansion to the terraced building like if you added 2 more houses to the end, each with their own front doors and living areas, structurally its the same as a terraced house.

So you are welcome to like me to a wayleave document that is legislation, where it explains what CF are doing is correct, I be very surprised if it requires them to force connection of neighbours for the purpose of splitting business costs, that is very likely a business decision not a legal one. The wayleave is more about having permission to do the work and doing it safely.


You welcome to tell me which part of that page you disagree with.
 
Caporegime
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
26,103
If each unit in your block has its own front door and front yard area with party wall agreements between each house then it's weird that they'd be registered as flats on the addressing database rather than 7A, 7B, 7C or whatever. However if the exterior walls of the building, the land it sits on, and the roof are owned by a freeholder that isn't you then that's when the wayleave agreement comes into force. Wayleaves are not needed to install services where they are crossing land or going through walls that is part of the property that the service is being installed into, as long as the installation isn't there to then serve other properties.

When you say you have a "ground floor flat" it sounds like there are two front doors, one leads into your home and the other goes upstairs to a flat above you - the land and the walls are not owned solely by you, though you (or your landlord if you rent) might own a proportion of the shares in the freehold and can grant the wayleave, but it's categorically not the same as a house.
 
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Soldato
Joined
29 Dec 2002
Posts
7,262
Some more for you to think about here. As I think you have made assumptions about my property, considering you mentioned HA's.

1 - CF allow legal occupier to approve works in rented houses.
2 - CF have chosen to stop communicating which is a form of passive aggression, when it seems they have something awkward to deal with, you said you found no problem with the way they handling this. For me choosing to not communicate is a problem and not professional, as an example if you turned down for a loan, the bank tells you, it doesnt simply not respond.
3 - CF have made no attempt to explain anything they required to do by law.
4 - CF have told me they thought I was living in an apartment block.
5 - My flat is like a small terraced house, there is no shared area's and structurally its the same neighbours on terraced housing, the other 2 flats are basically just an expansion to the terraced building like if you added 2 more houses to the end, each with their own front doors and living areas, structurally its the same as a terraced house.

So you are welcome to like me to a wayleave document that is legislation, where it explains what CF are doing is correct, I be very surprised if it requires them to force connection of neighbours for the purpose of splitting business costs, that is very likely a business decision not a legal one. The wayleave is more about having permission to do the work and doing it safely.


You welcome to tell me which part of that page you disagree with.
I disagree with your interpretation of my post, I clearly cited examples of where bulk wayleaves may come from eg councils. HA's, developers etc. I didn't suggest or infer that you were part of an HA, if you were this would be a lot easier. The guidance you posted clearly states wayleave is required for access to property owned by 3rd parties.

1. No. CF can't allow legal occupiers wishes to supersede the owners legal rights, that's why wayleave is a thing as per your link.
2. CF are non customer facing as a rule, they're a wholesale provider and you aren't a reseller, so frankly they were already going above and beyond by dealing with you. If your landlord wants to revise the wayleave terms, it's between him and them, and they aren't going to change position, you're now no longer part of that discussion.
3. See 1 & 2 - You're not part of the discussion as you have no legal standing.
4. Doesn't really matter what they assumed, they've identified that they need wayleave because you are not the owner of the land and they haven't got a bulk wayleave in place.
5. See 4.

You actually need me to link you to something that tells you that land that you don't own needs the land owners permission for you to have a 3rd party lay it's cables through it when your own link already tells you that? Seriously?! I mean the link is aimed more at network operators putting equipment in rather than individual end user installs, but the basic principal is the same.
 
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Soldato
Joined
27 Feb 2015
Posts
12,621
I disagree with your interpretation of my post, I clearly cited examples of where bulk wayleaves may come from eg councils. HA's, developers etc. I didn't suggest or infer that you were part of an HA, if you were this would be a lot easier. The guidance you posted clearly states wayleave is required for access to property owned by 3rd parties.

1. No. CF can't allow legal occupiers wishes to supersede the owners legal rights, that's why wayleave is a thing as per your link.
2. CF are non customer facing as a rule, they're a wholesale provider and you aren't a reseller, so frankly they were already going above and beyond by dealing with you. If your landlord wants to revise the wayleave terms, it's between him and them, and they aren't going to change position, you're now no longer part of that discussion.
3. See 1 & 2 - You're not part of the discussion as you have no legal standing.
4. Doesn't really matter what they assumed, they've identified that they need wayleave because you are not the owner of the land and they haven't got a bulk wayleave in place.
5. See 4.

You actually need me to link you to something that tells you that land that you don't own needs the land owners permission for you to have a 3rd party lay it's cables through it when your own link already tells you that? Seriously?! I mean the link is aimed more at network operators putting equipment in rather than individual end user installs, but the principal is the similar.
I dont know if you have misunderstood me, my landlord has already gave permission.

The issue is that CF want to enable two other properties who have no interest in the service, and you seem to be indicating they have a legal requirement to do that.

Also I pointed out to you on SDU's CF dont approach the landlord, hence rented houses having the same order process as live in owner houses. So in those cases they proceed without permission from the land owner. (they seem to have made a calculated decision they are unlikely to get sued on rental houses so go ahead anyway, and another calculated assumption that anything with a flat in the name has a shared communal area with communal areas most likely to cause legal complications). Before you say I am wrong on this from CF, their email they sent me the one that asked me to send the proof, clearly stated if its reclassified as an SDU they will proceed on my approving it as legal occupier. Not to mention all the people who have got CF installed in private rented SDU properties without their LL even knowing.

Its also clear from their original response to me (I live in an apartment block) they have just done some kind of lazy block categorisation.

I am not asking you to link something that says permission is required, I am asking you to link something that says the law requires them to ask the owner to waive liability and to agree to bulk installations for a single property to get connected.

They also havent said what their position is. Stonewalling is not a refusal, its just a non response. That stonewalling has also happened to my landlord.

You defending them is coming across as some kind of industry loyalty. It is apparently ok to think a terraced building is an apartment block, its ok to not respond on communication, its ok to give customers install dates as if installation will happen but with no disclaimer it depends on approval, you are also assuming I am at odds with the landowner as you are using the word supersede.

This practice you are defending, if I just sat here accepting it, I would be waiting 4 months oblivious to whats happening, to then be told its not happening or maybe even perpetually with them just constantly pushing the install date back.

--

On the telecom wayleave laws themselves, they clearly outdated and arguably not fit for purpose but thats a different discussion.

--

Other edit.

If CF had already said at this point we not going to install, whether its a business decision or they said due to legalities, I would have moved on, not necessarily happy but it would have been dealt with. As I said on the VM thread I think I have already had enough at this point and am likely to renew with VM on Monday.
 
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Soldato
Joined
29 Dec 2002
Posts
7,262
I dont know if you have misunderstood me, my landlord has already gave permission.

The issue is that CF want to enable two other properties who have no interest in the service, and you seem to be indicating they have a legal requirement to do that.

Also I pointed out to you on SDU's CF dont approach the landlord, hence rented houses having the same order process as live in owner houses. So in those cases they proceed without permission from the land owner. (they seem to have made a calculated decision they are unlikely to get sued on rental houses so go ahead anyway, and another calculated assumption that anything with a flat in the name has a shared communal area with communal areas most likely to cause legal complications). Before you say I am wrong on this from CF, their email they sent me the one that asked me to send the proof, clearly stated if its reclassified as an SDU they will proceed on my approving it as legal occupier. Not to mention all the people who have got CF installed in private rented SDU properties without their LL even knowing.

Its also clear from their original response to me (I live in an apartment block) they have just done some kind of lazy block categorisation.

I am not asking you to link something that says permission is required, I am asking you to link something that says the law requires them to ask the owner to waive liability and to agree to bulk installations for a single property to get connected.

They also havent said what their position is. Stonewalling is not a refusal, its just a non response. That stonewalling has also happened to my landlord.

You defending them is coming across as some kind of industry loyalty. It is apparently ok to think a terraced building is an apartment block, its ok to not respond on communication, its ok to give customers install dates as if installation will happen but with no disclaimer it depends on approval, you are also assuming I am at odds with the landowner as you are using the word supersede.

This practice you are defending, if I just sat here accepting it, I would be waiting 4 months oblivious to whats happening, to then be told its not happening or maybe even perpetually with them just constantly pushing the install date back.

--

On the telecom wayleave laws themselves, they clearly outdated and arguably not fit for purpose but thats a different discussion.
You're contradicting yourself. If your landlord had signed and returned unaltered wayleave forms to CF then you would have a actual confirmed install date and we wouldn't be having this conversation surely? You stated he wanted clauses removed and was only giving permission to CF for the single property you are in, not the two adjoining properties. Why he would want to do this dance three times is beyond me, but that's what you said.

Perhaps have a look here: https://cityfibre.com/landlords

Also industry loyalty because I speak from experience and you don't like the answer is hilarious, it'd be more logical (though equally dumb) to claim I was trying to retain you as a VM customer, followed up with I must have assumed you're at odds with the landlord because I pointed out they have legal rights and what you want is irrelevant? If your correspondence with them go like this then I can probably guess why you're getting nowhere fast. Get your landlord to return the forms, if he really only wants to do a single property at a time he should be able to, but they won't vary the terms for him. Everything else is irrelevant.
 
Soldato
Joined
27 Feb 2015
Posts
12,621
You're contradicting yourself. If your landlord had signed and returned unaltered wayleave forms to CF then you would have a actual confirmed install date and we wouldn't be having this conversation surely? You stated he wanted clauses removed and was only giving permission to CF for the single property you are in, not the two adjoining properties. Why he would want to do this dance three times is beyond me, but that's what you said.

Perhaps have a look here: https://cityfibre.com/landlords

Also industry loyalty because I speak from experience and you don't like the answer is hilarious, it'd be more logical (though equally dumb) to claim I was trying to retain you as a VM customer, followed up with I must have assumed you're at odds with the landlord because I pointed out they have legal rights and what you want is irrelevant? If your correspondence with them go like this then I can probably guess why you're getting nowhere fast. Get your landlord to return the forms, if he really only wants to do a single property at a time he should be able to, but they won't vary the terms for him. Everything else is irrelevant.

You have skipped over various points I have made, claimed I am not relevant at all. Claimed I dont accept the wayleave laws require approval, and said you see no issue with how CF handles this situation. However you seem to have very little business sense, I take it you wasnt customer facing in that role?

On the wayleave laws yes I am not involved as the law is written, however from a basic business point of view I am very relevant, without me there is no order, there is no end user, there is no revenue for Cityfibre for this address. This is likely why I got a response.

A reasonable response from you based on what information I have given you would have been something like this.

"Yeah Cityfibre have messed up here, you should have been already told that the order is subject to your landlord approving Cityfibres proposed process, and if there is no agreement then you will get no service" But instead you came in pretty aggressive seemingly on a mission to defend the telco company, so lets address a few things.

Cityfibre are consumer facing, they have a online checker where you can check if the service is available, if I enter my address it says the service is available, and also lists a bunch of partners of where I can order the service from. It does NOT say, that there is no agreement with my landlord in place, the legal requirements have not been met, it simply says the service is available. In addition Cityfibre currently have a £200 cashback offer for consumers, which I have signed up to, and they have been sending me emails on average twice aa week inviting me to sign up for their service. They also have contact us forms on various places on their website, not just for landlords.

In terms of how relevant I am from a basic business of point of view, the reason they likely responded to me, is of course they know without me, there is no installation at this address, they need someone to order the service and to pay for it, for this address, the most relevant person is myself, yes it is my landlord for the wayleave agreement, but it is myself for the actual service contract.

On what my landlord agreed to, he agreed to allow installation in all 3 properties in advance, so the other 2 tenants wouldn't need to go through this process, (bulk wayleave agreement), however Cityfibre were not satisfied with that and actually wanted to wire up all 3 properties causing disruption to his other tenants. This installation would be 3x full installations as all 3 properties are SDU's there is no shared area for some kind of termination point to be installed, we now know CF assumed there is a shared area for a termination point as they told me they had me down as an apartment block, obviously the main reason I contacted Cityfibre to try and get this corrected on their records to bring sanity to the process, it was not an attempt to bypass my landlord as you think it is, because I already have his agreement.

After some thinking I now have the opinion Vodafone and Zen handled this properly by not allowing me to order the service, my opinion is Cityfibre and its partners should not be accepting orders where they have not met requirements to install the service. What would have happened if I did no investigating, left the order to rot for 4 months, then maybe a week or so before the install date had VM disconnected, expecting CF to go live, and then finding out there is no installation. This is why communication is important. Its also clear CF have issues in categorising properties, assume some cost saving going on by not using surveyors, and instead making assumptions.

Now I was going to cancel the order right after renewing VM, however AAISP dont do long contracts, its just a monthly rolling deal, so what I am going to do now, is renew VM, but also not cancel this order, if this ends up getting installed whenever that may be (the install date given is July), I will have the option of cancelling after a single month, but then I would have everything already wired up so ordering again when VM is due for renewal would then be easy.

Whilst I appreciate the effort to reply and give me information, I do think you handled it wrong, and should have looked at it from both sides, I will leave this post here as a warning for other people in my situation.
 
Last edited:
Soldato
Joined
29 Dec 2002
Posts
7,262
You have skipped over various points I have made, claimed I am not relevant at all. Claimed I dont accept the wayleave laws require approval, and said you see no issue with how CF handles this situation. However you seem to have very little business sense, I take it you wasnt customer facing in that role?

On the wayleave laws yes I am not involved as the law is written, however from a basic business point of view I am very relevant, without me there is no order, there is no end user, there is no revenue for Cityfibre for this address. This is likely why I got a response.

A reasonable response from you based on what information I have given you would have been something like this.

"Yeah Cityfibre have messed up here, you should have been already told that the order is subject to your landlord approving Cityfibres proposed process, and if there is no agreement then you will get no service" But instead you came in pretty aggressive seemingly on a mission to defend the telco company, so lets address a few things.

Cityfibre are consumer facing, they have a online checker where you can check if the service is available, if I enter my address it says the service is available, and also lists a bunch of partners of where I can order the service from. It does NOT say, that there is no agreement with my landlord in place, the legal requirements have not been met, it simply says the service is available. In addition Cityfibre currently have a £200 cashback offer for consumers, which I have signed up to, and they have been sending me emails on average twice aa week inviting me to sign up for their service. They also have contact us forms on various places on their website, not just for landlords.

In terms of how relevant I am from a basic business of point of view, the reason they likely responded to me, is of course they know without me, there is no installation at this address, they need someone to order the service and to pay for it, for this address, the most relevant person is myself, yes it is my landlord for the wayleave agreement, but it is myself for the actual service contract.

On what my landlord agreed to, he agreed to allow installation in all 3 properties in advance, so the other 2 tenants wouldn't need to go through this process, (bulk wayleave agreement), however Cityfibre were not satisfied with that and actually wanted to wire up all 3 properties causing disruption to his other tenants. This installation would be 3x full installations as all 3 properties are SDU's there is no shared area for some kind of termination point to be installed, we now know CF assumed there is a shared area for a termination point as they told me they had me down as an apartment block, obviously the main reason I contacted Cityfibre to try and get this corrected on their records to bring sanity to the process, it was not an attempt to bypass my landlord as you think it is, because I already have his agreement.

After some thinking I now have the opinion Vodafone and Zen handled this properly by not allowing me to order the service, my opinion is Cityfibre and its partners should not be accepting orders where they have not met requirements to install the service. What would have happened if I did no investigating, left the order to rot for 4 months, then maybe a week or so before the install date had VM disconnected, expecting CF to go live, and then finding out there is no installation. This is why communication is important. Its also clear CF have issues in categorising properties, assume some cost saving going on by not using surveyors, and instead making assumptions.

Now I was going to cancel the order right after renewing VM, however AAISP dont do long contracts, its just a monthly rolling deal, so what I am going to do now, is renew VM, but also not cancel this order, if this ends up getting installed whenever that may be (the install date given is July), I will have the option of cancelling after a single month, but then I would have everything already wired up so ordering again when VM is due for renewal would then be easy.

Whilst I appreciate the effort to reply and give me information, I do think you handled it wrong, and should have looked at it from both sides, I will leave this post here as a warning for other people in my situation.
I’ll be honest, I started reading your reply and got mid way through the first paragraph and had an epiphany just as I suspect CityFibre who had no reason to deal with you did. This isn’t worth my time. I don’t really care what your landlord does, but you’re aware no unamended wayleave, no CityFibre and beyond that everything is irrelevant.

Good luck ;)
 
Soldato
Joined
27 Feb 2015
Posts
12,621
I’ll be honest, I started reading your reply and got mid way through the first paragraph and had an epiphany just as I suspect CityFibre who had no reason to deal with you did. This isn’t worth my time. I don’t really care what your landlord does, but you’re aware no unamended wayleave, no CityFibre and beyond that everything is irrelevant.

Good luck ;)
Thats fine, it basically ended with me accepting I am staying with VM, and saying they should probably have never took my order in the first place, which isnt a million miles from your original comment on the matter anyway.
 
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