Fibre Broadband Shares

[SBQ]

Enable rolled their cable past my gate around five years ago. I remember an Enable guy came around asking if I was interested in switching to broadband fibre, which I said I wasn't. Then he had another go asking if I thought I might change my mind in the next six months. This is fair enough and sensible marketing. Although nothing happened as I presume the neighbours at the time didn't want fibre broadband either. Subsequent neighbours did want fibre broadband. But that installation required permission from a third property tenant which they did not give (my immediate neighbour and the third party tenant did not get on). So nothing subsequent happened on that second occasion. Roll forward to today and there is -apparently- a kind of 'push' strategy going on: to get customers onto fibre that have not ordered it. Maybe Enable are taking the very long term view and such a strategy is sensible? Or maybe their installation contractors are 'in between new suburbs', so Enable need to find them work to do in the interim? (these days if you let contractors go, you might not get them back).

There is little doubt that fibre broadband is the best broadband technology from a performance perspective. But there is also little doubt that many broadband users find something 'less than the best' (in your case VDSL, in my case fixed mobile) more than good enough. The key comment you make about switching 'being a low priority' certainly resonates with me. And with the likes of Spark dangling so called 'fixed mobile' deals in front of their customers, there is often a low priority to seek out fibre alternatives when fixed wireless is offered. Perhaps the only way to compete with 'fixed mobile' is to have fibre broadband ready to go on the doorstep?

We have a special case in Christchurch where Chorus own the copper wires and Enable own the fibre. So maybe Enable are on a mission to 'get rid of Chorus' from Christchurch? I say that because once an alternative service is available, Chorus plan to eventually phase out their copper line service (which means more customers for enable or one of the fixed wireless providers). But if Chorus pull out their copper lines from Christchurch, then that means they are guaranteed to lose customers. I guess network dynamics are different when the owners of the copper and the owners of the fibre are different!

SNOOPY

P.S. Note that if you do decide to move away from VDSL but you change your mind later, your phone company will most likely not allow you to go back.

I was in the same situation where I had strong interest in switching over to fibre. Enable deployed their fibre lines about 8 years ago here and there was a massive backlog in trying to get installs finished - like at least 2 years. Then along came the horror stories of their botched installation jobs. They initially wanted to do a high quality install but instead, over the years they adopted a cheap method that was not critical. That is instead of boring underground trenching, they went to a cheap method of just running the conduit lines along the fence. Those who had alarm monitoring systems would learn that a burglar can easily cut the line on the fence and render the alarm useless. For myself I had 3 attempts to get the installation done back on those early years. The 1st attempt (during the peak demand for installs), I was doing a driveway reno with new concrete. After repeated calls they told me they would not allow use of a 3rd party conduit and that they would have to do the install by their team; of course the driveway guys could not delay the concrete work to suit Enable's schedule. The 2nd attempt I had 2 site scope engineers visit and because of the long distance my line was, they thought they could make the fibre connection at the other end (my other neighbour's line). Of course they didn't get back to me and they also would not come to do a job that I wanted in bringing the line to the exterior of my house.

Since the time Enable deployed their fibre lines here (8+ years), my internet had been on the copper DSL which provided VERY reliable service and I mean few disconnections. Of those 8 years, we were on ADSL for 5 years. Then what happened was Chorus (who own the copper lines) started jacking up the price and Spark magically passed on a $10 extra fee for internet access. Imaging going from $80/month 8 years ago to paying $120/month as there were 3 price hikes. Spark said they could offer me lower pricing IF we switched over to fibre ; but the horror of fibre installs made me switch to Now NZ which were cheaper and they helped me go from ADSL to VDSL2. For over 3 years that service was very good and fast enough. But then again, the line charges went up.

The writing was on the wall as I looked around my neighbours. Nearly ALL of them had switched over to fibre and did not care how shoddy the installation jobs were. There were many botched up concrete cuts to the foot paths just to get their fibre line in. A real mess and collateral damage where the concrete cracks all the way across. Then the clips they use to fix the conduit to the exterior walls all rust up, leaving rust stains on the brick work. I guess for most people they don't know any better. So back in January I discovered that Enable was OPEN to have the home owner supply and do the fibre installation. The cost for 20mm PVC tubing was minor (some 40 metres) and the trenching all done myself according to their guidelines (sweeping bends):

https://i.imgur.com/LSpGEPt.jpg

When the fibre installers came, they knew I was very fussy. One guy asked how was I able to drill a hole in the concrete so close to the brick cladding and yet have the conduit pass through under the concrete foot path? He said they would never install that way and instead would do a side blade cut down the concrete so the fibre like would drop in the gap. But he did say the way I did would be the best and least evasive to the concrete work.

However, the transition to fibre has not been a smooth one. Despite they ran the fibre line direct from the cabinet down the street, to my house, through the ETP box, all the way to the fibre modem (no cuts in the line), we still had problems with the voice homeline. After 3 calls over a month, I gave up and kept the voice line on the copper lines. Then after 3 months, I assume Spark disconnected the copper so I went back to taking the phone line off the fibre modem. However, I had a hell of a time trying to get Now NZ to fix the voice line for not having incoming calls. I could dial out but nothing coming in. I had to escalate the complaint to TDR (Telecommunications Disputes Resolution) and Now NZ insisted it was Spark's end for not porting my ph# properly. After 2 weeks of complaints I was receiving calls but no caller ID. So I made a call today and hopefully they've fixed it.

Anyways forgive my long comments here. I just wanted to share how difficult the transition from copper DSL to Fibre. Also in real world terms, no one in the house finds fibre really that much faster than copper. The YouTube channels still take just as long to load and there's still sometimes buffering.

[SailorRob]

$CABO

Don't mess about with less.