Broadband issues in Hesleden and Castle Eden

At the last meeting of The Hesledens Residents' Association meeting held last Saturday there were one or two queries raised about progress with BT's rollout of broadband provision in The Hesledens, Castle Eden and parts of Blackhall Colliery (please refer to previous posts dated back from the last one on Wednesday 15 March 2017).

Following a request to the Digital Durham team at county hall they have provided an update on the latest developments:

Dear Cllr Crute

Please find a response to your query below. I’ve included an introduction about the need to upgrade to a fibre broadband service once it’s available, and then a separate response relating to the Castle Eden and Hesleden areas.

Residents will need to upgrade to the service

The installation of fibre broadband to an area does not have any effect on residents current (standard) broadband speeds. It is an opt in service, and faster speeds can only be obtained if a resident upgrades to a fibre broadband service through an Internet Service Provider (BT, Sky, Talk Talk, EE, etc). Broadband comparison sites can often help find the best deals.

I know there’s a lot of advertising in relation to fibre broadband, but it isn’t uncommon for residents just to presume their speeds will automatically increase. This is something that we focus heavily on in our leafleting following the installation of fibre broadband to an area under the Digital Durham programme.

Castle Eden

Fibre broadband is already available to the Castle Eden area via Wellfield cabinet 8. If anyone would like to check their properties potential speeds, this is a link to site: https://www.btwholesale.com/includes/adsl/main.html
Or this one is much more straightforward to use in terms of confirming if a fibre broadband service is available: http://www.homeandwork.openreach.co.uk/when-can-i-get-fibre.aspx
You can point any Castle Eden residents in our direction if they are saying that they are unable to upgrade to fibre broadband.

Hesleden
There is only one cabinet in Hesleden that has not been upgraded to fibre and that is Wellfield cabinet 9.

Cabinet 9 is planned for upgrade under BT’s own commercial programme. Openreach estimate that the cabinet will be upgraded to supply fibre broadband services by the end of December 2017.

Residents can track progress directly on the OpenReach website: https://www.homeandwork.openreach.co.uk/when-can-i-get-fibre.aspx

Openreach can also be contacted about their commercial programme directly at: https://www.homeandwork.openreach.co.uk/help-and-support/fibre-broadband-availability.aspx