FTTC Inverness (MACDHUI) - Exchange only lines

Hi there,

Bit of a shot in the dark here but there seems to be some quite knowledgeable people here so perhaps someone might have access to some information!

I am on the Inverness MACDHUI exchange however I am in the town centre and am connected directly to the exchange, and as we all know that is a no go for FTTC. For the last 18 months I have had various email conversations with Openreach and also HIE who are working with BT up here on the government funded bit, the best I've had is "your property should be getting looked at but we have no more information". Needless to say I'm getting a bit frustrated, and just to rub it in, they installed a new fibre cabinet about 50m from me just outside the car park to the flats for the buildings across the road!

Anyway I was wondering if anyone here would have any better information, like I say it's maybe a shot in the dark but I thought I'd ask anyway.

Many thanks,
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Ade

Hi Ade,

I'll be the bearer of probably bad news for you. All the discussions I've had with HIE and Openreach/BT regarding the Highlands rollout have indicated that EO lines are a much lower priority than getting the FTTC rollout going.

Couple this with the fact that the Macdhui exchange is part of BT's commercial rollout rather than the HIE plans, and my understanding that there are some major backhaul capacity issues at Macdhui right now and I don't think you will be seeing any movement on EO lines for a very long time.

It's a shame really, because Inverness had the potential to be a very high bandwidth city given that the outer edges are now mostly done, as well as the Culloden/Smithton/Milton of Leys area. If they could just add in the EO lines then the coverage would be phenominal.

Regards,

RobC.

Hi Rob,

Aye in my own discussion with HIE I was also told EO lines would be lowest priority, but that they would be getting looked at at some point, so there's still a bit of hope. Maybe they will surprise us and tell us we are all getting FTTP..... hey, I can dream!

Are you in the town centre as well?

Cheers
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Ade

Well, technically just before the apocalypse still classes as "at some point..."

I'm actually through in Forres but I run an IT company and have several business customers in Inverness. I also work closely with an Inverness-based phone company.

RobC.