[LINK] We can screw up fibre as badly as we did copper

[David Boxall]

Aren't we clever? :/

<https://choice.community/t/the-never-never-broadband-network/5224/23>
> NubglummerySnr    Oct 13
>
> We were fortunate enough to find a rental property to move into that's 
> in one of the few areas that actually have fibre to the premises. The 
> house we left had a perfectly good ADSL line and we put it to good 
> use. We had a bit of trouble after we moved into the NBN zone though.
>
> Firstly, because the area was flagged as NBN ready, we couldn't simply 
> port our ADSL account over, which was a problem because our house 
> wasn't actually connected to the NBN fibres that lived out under the 
> footpath across the road from us.
>
> Secondly, getting the house connected to the NBN fibres that lived out 
> under the footpath across the road from us took a good 2 months of 
> blunders from both NBN Co and Telstra, so in all that time we had no 
> home phone and no Internet connection whatsoever.
>
> We were originally hoping to go with Optus because they had a better 
> value plan that we liked. So after contacting them, they organised a 
> date for the NBN Co contractors to come out and connect us up. Problem 
> was, there were no contractors available for at least two weeks. So we 
> had to wait, with no phone or Internet, even though there was a fully 
> functioning old phone jack on the wall that produced a dial tone, but 
> which was connected to the old copper network, so we weren't allowed 
> to utilise it.
>
> A couple of days before the big day we got a message from NBN Co that 
> there was a shortfall and a team would need to investigate, which 
> would again take a couple of weeks before anyone could come out to 
> look at it again. Optus told us that they couldn't do anything to help 
> us without the house being connected and said we'd have to contact 
> Telstra because they're the only telco that actually have technicians 
> in our area, so we had to sign on with them for a more expensive 2 
> year contract in order to get the ball rolling so we could get the 
> cables attached to our house.
>
> After many weeks of delays and remade appointments we eventually got 
> someone out who discovered that we weren't connected to the optic 
> fibres out in the street, which is what we kept telling them because 
> there was no box attached to the house.
>
> More delays and cancelled appointments happened and finally an NBN Co 
> contractor arrived with vast quantities of fibre optic cables to 
> connect us to the outside world... except, he didn't have permission 
> to climb the poles in our long driveway so he could attach the cables 
> to them. Apparently they were owned by Telstra and NBN Co would need 
> to make a formal request to use them.... even though it was Telstra 
> that had told them to do the work in the first place.
>
> Anyways, we now have super fast NBN speeds at a higher than wanted 
> cost, but it's just as well because on Friday last week we awoke to a 
> red light on the NBN box saying that the optic cable was no longer 
> providing a signal and Optus probably would've just thrown their arms 
> up in the air saying they didn't know what to do again.
>
> We contacted Telstra who organised for NBN Co to arrive the following 
> Monday, so we had no home phone or Internet over the weekend. Monday 
> morning an NBN Co contractor arrived and discovered that our personal 
> optic fibre wire was somehow exposed from the pit it lives in across 
> the road from our house and had been severed, probably from a 
> lawnmower or whipper snipper. They suspect the last person doing 
> maintenance in the pit forgot to clean up after himself and didn't 
> tuck our wire away when he put the lid back on the thing. So the NBN 
> Co contractor that originally climbed our Telstra owned poles had to 
> come around that afternoon, and climb them again, in gale force winds, 
> to replace the entire cable which runs along 5 power poles in order to 
> get from the pit across the road, to our house along our extended 
> driveway.
>
> All working again now. It was a journey to get it in the first place, 
> and is quite vulnerable if the maintenance people don't pay attention 
> when they're packing up, but we're very happy with it for the most part.

-- 
David Boxall                    |  Any given program,
                                 |  when running correctly,
http://david.boxall.id.au       |  is obsolete.
                                 |       --Arthur C. Clarke