Some customers trying to order a broadband package via ISPs on CityFibre’s new Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network are finding, in certain locations, that the wholesale operator has been rejecting orders where their network is “at capacity“. This is despite continuing to list the same addresses as being available on their website.
First things first. All broadband networks can run into issues of capacity, such as those that might occur when there aren’t enough spare ports currently available for new connections on a specific street or where the local supply of data capacity (backhaul etc.) has become oversubscribed.
Good capacity management usually helps to avoid most of this. But even the best operators can sometimes run into the odd issue, and it’s how you deal with those that really matters. For example, some operators will simply block the ability to place new orders for locations in this boat or may instead adopt a ‘Waiting List‘ strategy, where customers are placed into a queue until such time as the issue is resolved. Good communication is also key.
In the case of the CityFibre complaints we’ve seen, a few customers have reported to ISPreview that their orders were simply rejected – often without a clear explanation (i.e. they weren’t initially told it was due to a capacity issue or when the problem would be resolved). But after a bit of nudging by those involved, it was later confirmed to be a capacity issue (although they didn’t specify what kind).
Just to confuse matters further, related customers found that CityFibre’s website (and sometimes supporting ISPs) were continuing to list their addresses as being available to order. Suffice to say that customers were left with a confusing picture and no clear indication of when the issue would actually be resolved, let alone how they’d be able to tell without going through the whole order process again.
A CityFibre Spokesperson told ISPreview:
“We continuously manage and increase capacity to stay ahead of demand but we are aware of a very small number of cases where we’ve had to decline an individual order. We would like to apologise to anyone affected and assure customers that our network capacity is being continuously extended to ensure everyone has the opportunity to access it.
We are enhancing our availability tracker to ensure it takes into account such cases, as well as working closely with our ISP partners to further improve the customer experience.”
Sadly, CityFibre didn’t provide any indication of precisely when their availability tracker would be enhanced or how, but we welcome that they’ve recognised the need for improvements and were quick to respond when the matter was raised. In most of these cases the capacity issue itself does not, we believe, appear to have been related to port availability, which suggests a different cause.
CityFibre currently aspires to cover up to 8 million UK premises with their new FTTP network (funded by c.£2.4bn in equity, c.£4.9bn debt and c.£800m of BDUK subsidy) – across over 285 cities, towns and villages (c.30% of the UK). But it remains unclear precisely when this will be achieved. The original goal was for the end of 2025, although their current build + M&A plan may get them up to c.6m (if it all goes well).
In any case, as networks grow, it wouldn’t be uncommon to see a rise in capacity related complaints, although it should be stressed that such issues are usually quite uncommon and typically only impact a tiny percentage of an operator’s national network at any one time.