Fibre to home

Not sure if this is the correct board to post this.

Currently we have fibre to cabinet broadband but as the distance to the exchange is quite a lot we don't get brilliant speeds (roughly 20mbs). However, we have a school opposite us which is currently having a direct fibre connection installed (its an underground box being worked on by Open Reach).
I spoke to one of the Open Reach guys and asked him as the junction box (not sure if that is the correct term) is only 20 meters from our house would we be able to get Fibre to Home installed from there. He said we should be able to using the spare cables.
So my question is how do I track the progress of this to make sure I don't miss out being able to get this installed? Will this show on checker sites or will it need a special order with BT/BT Open Reach (or Sky my current provider).
Hope that makes sense.

Distance from the exchange is irrelevant for FTTC, your connection speed and quality is governed by the copper cable length and quality from the FTTC cab to your house.

The fibre connection to the school is most likely a leased line and of no use for FTTP.

Have you checked here to see what is currently available to you and if the estimated speeds are similar to what you currently achieve?: BT Broadband Availability Checker

In reply to a post by ianhrp:

I spoke to one of the Open Reach guys and asked him as the junction box (not sure if that is the correct term) is only 20 meters from our house would we be able to get Fibre to Home installed from there. He said we should be able to using the spare cables.

Only *if* the school is getting FTTP (not a leased line), *and* your property is served from the same underground chamber as the school.

With FTTP, the "junction box" as you call it is called a "connectorised block terminal", and it looks like this:
https://www.thinkbroadband.com/assets/images/news-20...

(from this article)

It has a bunch of nipples on it, each one to serve one property - a minimum of four.

In reply to a post by ianhrp:

So my question is how do I track the progress of this to make sure I don't miss out being able to get this installed? Will this show on checker sites or will it need a special order with BT/BT Open Reach (or Sky my current provider).

It will show on checker websites, for those ISPs which resell Openreach FTTP. Sky now does that, although not necessarily in all areas.

For the general answer, go to the BT Wholesale broadband checker, select your address, and look for "WBC FTTP" (not "FTTP on demand" which is something else, a very expensive bespoke service). But it won't tell you if it's on its way, only that it's available when it is.

Or go to the Openreach fibre checker, which sometimes gives a hint that FTTP is on its way, but it may also change its mind.

Thanks for the reply, yep that is what is being installed/worked on (sneaked a look when I was talking to them).
Fingers crossed its the one that feeds to the property. I believe they are getting FTTP rather than a leased line. I will have to keep an eye on the checker.
Hopefully, we can get it as our current fibre (to the cabinet) is annoyingly slow for our needs.

If it is FTTP then they must have paid for FTTPoD in which case any others on that node will have it available once it goes live. If they are getting native FTTP then you will only benefit if you can already get native FTTP anyway.

In reply to a post by ian72:

If it is FTTP then they must have paid for FTTPoD

Or they were part of some other project, e.g. Openreach agreed to provide FTTP to all the schools in the area, perhaps as part of a larger deal for connecting council offices or whatever.

Most of the wider area deals use private networks / leased lines rather than public access systems such as FTTP