Openreach are working to improve their network to get faster fibre broadband to as many people in the UK as possible. However, there are some areas which they don’t currently plan to upgrade, or areas already upgraded to fibre where people want to have an even faster internet connection. In these instances, a potential solution is a Community Fibre Partnership (CFP).
What’s a Community Fibre Partnership?
Openreach will work with your local community to build a customised fibre solution to bring fibre broadband to homes and businesses.
A joint funding arrangement is put in place, which means Openreach contribute some of the costs and the community funds the rest. Openreach will then build the most affordable solution they can to meet the community’s needs. They will also advise on any grants available to help pay the community’s part e.g. from local authorities or the Government.
If your area already has fibre broadband, you can also use a Community Fibre Partnership to upgrade to even faster speeds.
Case study – Jennie Ashby, Charfield
Jennie from Charfield in South Gloucestershire started a Community fibre Partnership scheme in January 2021.
She had moved house in 2015 and despite only moving two streets away, found that their broadband speeds were drastically affected. “We were amazed by the difference it made to our broadband – we were only moving two streets away, not into the middle of nowhere.” Jennie explained.
“We are now in an older house that was built before the main modern estates in Charfield. Unfortunately, this means the ‘green box’ our telephone line is connected to is located in Wotton-under-edge, some three miles away and our broadband speeds dropped from 35Mbps to 3Mbps (on a good day) or even 0.01Mbps (bad day).
“On initially contacting Openreach and doing so repeatedly every time our fragile line broke down, we were told nothing could be done to improve our situation, not even ordering a new line. It was hard not to feel bitter when new houses started springing up around us with full FTTP connection. I then contacted our local councillor to ask for help and he has asked the question repeatedly at local government level – why were we constantly being excluded from any fibre funding projects?
“Finally, in January this year we contacted Openreach again and were told to explore two options – the USO via BT and a Community Fibre Partnership (CFP). After reading up on both, I applied to Openreach for an initial assessment for a CFP. Openreach then sent me a portal where I could check addresses to see who needed to be a part of our scheme. I was surprised to find it was as many as 24 homes that were affected. I submitted the application, and waited for news.
“At this point with the help of our local councillor, we reached out to local residents via our village Facebook page – I felt it wasn’t appropriate to go door to door as we were still under lockdown conditions.
Openreach responded to the application with an offer letter with an initial cost estimate of £18,000. “It was then time to do some further investigation as Openreach’s version of our local network was out of date – some houses had been demolished etc – so I reached out to some local residents to gauge reaction. We couldn’t have a public meeting at that stage, but I did have a Zoom meeting with our Rural Engagement Officer at Openreach. Our local councillor also spoke to our broadband project officer at the council, to check the validity of the Gigabit vouchers and if we would be eligible. We worked out that we would have enough vouchers to cover our cost of the build, so gave the go ahead to Openreach to carry out a formal survey. They came back to me in August with a Final Offer letter where the cost had drastically reduced – I guess they had discovered that the fibre cables were already here, under the main road.
“Now it was time to reach out to the local community so I have written to every household (and business) with a form attached asking them if they are interested and would agree to pledge their voucher to the scheme. I already have more than enough pledges to cover the cost. I have also written an article for our local village magazine, to cover anyone who I might have missed.
“I finally heard back from Openreach at the end of September, to say we are going through their system and our case is with the DCMS and we should be ready to formally register voucher pledges in the next couple of weeks. We should hopefully be ready to sign our contract soon – and from then on Openreach have 12 months to build the network.”