Aberdeen - dreadful speeds tonight - line congestion?

[jellyman]

On CityFibre 900 and speeds are near unusable. Switched to the mobile dongle and they were even worse.

What is going on?

[Ripshod]

I saw somewhere else on the forums that Cityfibre are making some (overrunning) upgrades. I don't know if this affects everyone on this thread, certainly not those on openreach. I only mention this because, without digging back too far, I only see Cityfibre mentioned. 

[Doddie]

Sorry for what might be a dumb question, but what is an overrunning upgrade?

[Ripshod]

They're making upgrades, but they're running late. 

[Doddie]

Thanks Ripshod, my cables were laid by Cityibre circa 4 or 5 years ago and then to my surprise another company came along about 2 years ago and laid yet more fibre cables to my tennement so maybe that is the upgrade you refer too that is over running?
Interesting and i'll have to look into that.

[user99]

I'm going to give Vodafone the benefit of the doubt and give them time to fix the fault. They have been keeping me updated and they have said (IIRC) that some equipment changes will be made to network, affecting those in Aberdeen, sometime mid week (20/21 August), but if it's not fixed within a reasonable amount of time then a complaint to Ofcom and CISAS (Communication & Internet Services Adjudication Scheme) will be forthcoming. I don't know if Ofcom or CISAS will help but it can't do no harm.

From Ofcom: "If the broadband speeds you are getting are far below the original estimate your provider gave you, you might be protected under the voluntary Code of Practice that applies to most internet service providers."

[RebelRose]

How have they been updating you? I'm a little disappointed that I heard nothing from them again after they told me it was due to be fixed in July. I just assumed it must've gone to plan.

I'm relieved to hear that it might just be delayed. I was beginning to wonder whether they'd told me a load of nonsense just to get my case closed.

I believe you need to have had an open complaint for a certain amount of time (8 weeks I think) before you can escalate to Ofcom/CISAS. You have to follow Vodafone's formal complaint procedure and have it open for 8 weeks first. I tried to do this, and they closed it after week as "Resolved!" without any input from me (it wasn't resolved), and they refused to re-open it.

[user99]

I know about the 8 week wait and this may make things moot as my contract with Vodafone runs out in a little over 8 weeks so biding my time, wait 8 weeks, then jumping ship might be my best option. They have been pretty good at keeping me updated by phoning me, a few calls since I raised the fault, so I have to say there customer service has been very good, even if there internet service is not.

[user99]

P.S.

Unfortunately if the fault is with CityFibre then jumping ship and moving to a new ISP may not fix the problem - unless the new ISP has a bigger stick with which to beat CityFibre. Do Openreach provide FTTP in Aberdeen, and do they use there own independent equipment or do they have some sort of sharing deal with CityFibre ?

[Doddie]

The people who have the biggest stick are probably local authorities and the UK Govt, the latter pumped billions of pounds into Cityfibre for them to rollout the infrastructure so it's doubtful that anyone has a bigger stick than them if Cityfibre can't or won't expedite a fix to whatever is going on.

[dfunky]

Openreach has fibre in some areas, Inverurie for sure and possibly some central areas of the city.
My area of the city is FTTC for openreach, only cityfibre have FTTP laid.