Forum Discussion

KyleHatch's avatar
KyleHatch
Joining in
25 days ago

Virgin Access behind me but not in front of me.

Hi, not entirely sure on the best place to put this, but as similar topics were in this sections, i've opted for here.

Between my wife and I, we had been long-time Virgin Media customers, unfortunately when we moved into our latest property last year, it was not serviced by Virgin, and given the entire cul-de-sac wasn't it seemed unlikely it ever would be (it would be a lot of digging to get all the way round to us).

It's particularly annoying as Virgin does run on the street behind the garden, which is a main road. All the properties there can get Virgin with no issue. I have struggled with Sky (the house is in a dip, so the TV reception was poor), and their internet was pants. And currently on TalkTalk, but the service keeps dropping. Both my wife and I work from home and rely on a strong fast connection for our jobs.

Speaking to a friend recently they mentioned they'd previously had a property where they'd been off the virgin grid, but they'd been able to get a line installed through their garden to gain access. So I thought I'd see what the art of the possible was.

I see from previous threads this is usually a PM job, so I'm hoping someone can pick up my case. Thanks Kyle.

  • KyleHatch's avatar
    KyleHatch
    Joining in
    17 days ago

    Thank you for your responses. I'm unaware if we are in a legacy area. The area that does get Virgin only seems to have done so recently, so I imagine that is relatively new. My cul de sac is a new build with no connection. 

    Unfortunately, as mentioned, the house is in a dip, so the phone signal is intermittent. The signal on the top of the house is quite strong, but my office is on the bottom floor of a townhouse. My wife and I are both on 5G for our phones. I find my daily life not great, but she has no problems. 

    I have also reached out to Open Reach and am awaiting a response. They recently updated the cabinets; maybe I'll be lucky, and they are planning fibre upgrades. 

    I appreciate the replies. 

    • Carley_S's avatar
      Carley_S
      Forum Team
      15 days ago

      Hi KyleHatch 

      Welcome to the Community Forums. 

      Sorry to hear that your area isn't serviceable with us and you're currently having a hard time working from home. 

      You mention that the area is a new build area, how long has the new build been completed? Are you aware of any contractual obligations with the developer that residents must use a particular network for a length of time? 

       

      • KyleHatch's avatar
        KyleHatch
        Joining in
        12 days ago

        2006, and we are not aware of anything, when we bought the property, we inquired if there was a particular thing in place, but no one could find anything. 

  • Roger_Gooner's avatar
    Roger_Gooner
    Alessandro Volta
    25 days ago

    You have chosen the wrong house and it's a problem. VM is overbuilding its network with fibre, meaning no expansion. There are large areas being installed with fibre by VM's partner nexfibre and you may get an answer if you make an enquiry. You can also ask Openreach if it plans to upgrade its network in your area with fibre.

  • legacy1's avatar
    legacy1
    Alessandro Volta
    25 days ago

    If you don't need inbound traffic you can go 5G if its in your area

  • nodrogd's avatar
    nodrogd
    Very Insightful Person
    25 days ago

    The difficulty you will have, especially if you are on VMs legacy cable network is that:

    1) Street cabinets have a finite capacity that was accounted for years ago when the networks were built. The cabinets were only designed to serve the number of houses in the roads they were installed on.

    2) The maximum distance a customer is from the cabinet is also a factor. The cabinet amplifier is only capable of driving the signal down around 100 - 150 metres of coax, depending on local factors.

    Also when you consider there is a budget ceiling VM will not go over per connection, there is probably very little chance you will get connected to the older type networks.