General Chat

Has anyone any experiance of satalite broadband, I have been trying to get openreach to supply a phone line to my new static caravan (had one in other van )but they want approx £900 to put in 27feet of cable has to go underground its soft dig as its across grass, this started last year when I bought the new van, open reach said i have to pay this as caravans can be moved so they loose money and so the people who have them are not classed as "stable " they not taking into account its a 37x12 caravan that's all anchored down I tried to explain to them I have been on the site for 16 years, site rules can't rent van out so its just me and my family use the van, and i had a phone line in the other caravan for 7 years that they installed, its a holiday site so can't have mail sent to site have lived in my house over 30 years they would be paid through a bank account as it had been before and that I have had for over 30 years, I have now tried again to get the phone put in but it seems that I am coming up against the same arguments from bt/openreach the mobile signal is very poor and I have bought 3 Internet dongles and a booster but its such a poor reception area that nothing works can anyone give some advise , many thanks pam :-D

There used to be a member on here who had satellite broadband, and whilst it worked, he did have problems too as it isn't suitable for certain applications largely due to problems with something called latency, which is adversely affected by the additional length of time it takes for the signal to travel up to the satellite and back down again to earth, compared to normal broadband.

It isn't that cheap, either.

I don't know how up to date it is but this site has information which may help

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/guide/satellite-broadband.html

Yes, I have used satellite internet in a variety of situations.
The fixed type is generally used in remote / difficult locations.
The installation kit is not cheap neither are the subs.
Once installed it works ok for web browsing, email and social networking. However the ping times are poor and as a result gaming impossible, sniping eBay auctions in the last few seconds iffy and iPlayer HD, NetFlix so-so, same with Skype

Unless you have a data unlimited contract downloading movies not a good idea.

I got BT to install a land line to a houseboat without any problems, I would have thought that a connection to a fixed caravan was routine. Once you have the landline you can use any net provider eg Sky, TT and so on.

Many thanks for your replies, Openreach will install a line but at a cost of £900 , which I think is rather expensive for the small amount of work they have to do, I had a line in the other caravan which Openreach installed 6 years ago and it cost me approx £120, I was told by BT that they would class this as a house move but Openreach wont, and you cant contact Openreach as they wont speak to you they tell you to go through your provider but I havnt got one cos I cant get a line installed . I did speak to Ofcom and they told me that everyone should be able to have a telephone line and they allow you up to £3400 for installation of one but Openreach wont allow this to be for caravans, I even quoted the Ofcom rule " Universal service of Obligation " which says Universal Service ensures that basic fixed line services are available at an affordable price to all citizen-customers across the UK. I just dont think £900 is a reasonable price when it only cost £120 a few years ago, yesterday I was told that they would contact me within 2 working days so its wait and see if they phone tomorrow but dont think I will hold my breath waiting, again many thanks Pam