Results of investigations.

The connection in place is a 100Mbps leased line (Fibre to the premises). It has been in place for 3 years.
It was a new connection and was installed because high speed internet (FTTC) was not available.
For info, Openreach connectivity is 1.4Km away (about 1 mile) and there are no plans in place to have this ‘area’ updated anytime soon.
This is a domestic property where the ‘user’ works from home. (Just average Sharepoint document access and a few Zoom calls) Therefore not data intensive and no real requirement for intense SLA’s (Mobile tethering actually works fine as a backup).
The plan was to see the initial 3-year installation contract through with extortionate pricing, and then revert back to ‘normal’ domestic high speed internet.
Having spent over £12,800 in the 3 years, it was thought that we could go back to about £50 per month with what was assumed as normal, average internet speed/connectivity.
But noooooooooo, not a chance!
Apparently, even though we may have a perfectly good (nearly new) fibre connection from the property to the exchange. It’s the wrong gender or wrong pronoun or something, and they can’t plug that into the domestic internet service in the exchange.
The current provider does not provide any domestic solution and although the 3-year term is up, the price still remains £300 + VAT (Rounded up to ‘round’ figures), although we could continue on a one month rolling contract with a three (yes, 3) month notice period.
On contacting other providers, it seems that they would need to do a FULL survey (possibly replacing the ‘new’ fibre we had installed not long ago) and sign up to another lengthy period with similar extortionate costs (maybe a difference of £25 or so, shopping around)
Talk about money for ‘old rope’….
It seems that it is not possible to have a leased line without certain (not required) guarantees that they would likely ‘break’ anyway!
Therefore my options are:
1. Keep paying ridiculous prices for an over specified ‘business’ leased line at 100Mb
2. Opt for a slow (10Mb – 30Mb) domestic broadband line
3. Try Elon’s Skynet!

Option 3 looks to be favourable at the moment, because if the equipment is purchased at the start (about 2 months worth of current payments), then the monthly cost will be approx. £75 per month for 300Mbps

I’ve looked into speed, reliability and latency, and its all fine, REALLY!

So, Unless anyone has some compelling evidence that I’m unaware of, then I think my mind is made up!

You're using the terms leased line and FTTP interchangeably still, which is probably where a lot of this confusion is coming from. You say that the plan was to see out the contract and then revert to a domestic package - where did this plan come from? If the company that sold you the leased line proposed it and you have that in writing then it's probably time to speak to a solicitor.

From my perspective it seems like you have made a lot of assumptions which unfortunately were incorrect.

Edited by jpm (Wed 28-Feb-24 11:46:01)

Quite JPM, Larry or his company should have gone FTTPoD route but went leased lines instead...

i'm utterly confused by the text as well as he's using two different products interchangeably and along with that, ranting ...... We don't know the product nor the company who was involved.

The price can't have been that ridiculous if you've been happy to pay for it for 3 years! If all you are doing is "average sharepoint document access and a few Zoom calls" then I'd suggest getting some nice cheap Plusnet or some other bargain basement broadband and be done with it.

I also cannot believe you only had 100Mbps for that price, I'd have thought 1Gbit would have been available at not much more - either way, definitely sounds like you have an Ethernet leased line service to me with no easy way of moving it to a cheaper provider.

For what it's worth I have Starlink and it's fine - the latency is higher than even copper FTTC broadband, but the speed is very good, 100-300mbps depending on the time of day. Usually faster in the evenings.

In reply to a post by _Larry_:

The plan was to see the initial 3-year installation contract through with extortionate pricing, and then revert back to ‘normal’ domestic high speed internet.
Having spent over £12,800 in the 3 years, it was thought that we could go back to about £50 per month with what was assumed as normal, average internet speed/connectivity.

Nope, that's confusing FTTPoD and regular Fibre Ethernet - the former works that way, the latter doesn't - it's different technology.

In reply to a post by j0hn83:

The subject specifically says a leased line.
The 3 year minimum term on FTTPoD ended in 2018. Since then it has been a 12 month minimum term.
WBC FTTP doesn't become available after the minimum term, but as soon as the FTTPoD is ready to go live. It isn't available.

For those 3 reasons I think it's pretty clear this is a leased line and not FTTPoD.

Except the poster has been talking about things that sound like FTTPoD but thanks for your catty response.

In reply to a post by _Larry_:

Apparently, even though we may have a perfectly good (nearly new) fibre connection from the property to the exchange. It’s the wrong gender or wrong pronoun or something, and they can’t plug that into the domestic internet service in the exchange.

Ignoring your stupid commentary about pronouns, they're not the same thing.

The 'domestic' thing you're talking about is GPON - passive optical. The leased line (Fibre Ethernet) is an active fibre setup.

Goes to very different equipment, works differently, different network infrastructure etc.

There is, to put it nicely 'sod all' chance you'll get to use that fibre for a 'domestic' type of service (eg FTTP) for £50... none, nada. zilch.

Did you bother to read and learn anything from the posts between your opening post and your second post as those explained clearly why you cannot convert your leased line to a traditional cheap FTTP service. Nothing has changed in the last 3 years so honestly you should have got clarity from the leased line company before embarking on an extremely expensive 3 year contract with nothing at the end of it. As others have said if you had gone for FTTPoD you would have had the outcome you wanted.

In reply to a post by _Larry_:

. . . Mobile tethering actually works fine as a backup . . ..

If the mobile tethering works fine have you considered ditching any sort of landline connection and using just the mobile signal through a proper router? You are not setting a very high barrier if your landline option is only 10 - 30 Mb.

In reply to a post by PCJM40:

Did you bother to read and learn anything from the posts between your opening post and your second post as those explained clearly why you cannot convert your leased line to a traditional cheap FTTP service.

Looks like someone made the wrong choice of service, now wants to lay the blame elsewhere.