Wooo Hooo!!! It works – Waterloo Farm can get ADSL Broadband!! What a huge relief, but what a nightmare and trauma it has been to get it, I think I have aged 10 years in the process! There is too much to write in full, but a short summary follows:
- Thursday 31st July
- After much wrangling and calling all and sundry, I convinced the ISP to call the phone line provider and check on the progress of the DACS removal – they were told that it had already been removed!! They were just waiting for the job to be closed so that could provision Broadband ASAP. I was almost in shock!!
- I got on the phone to Mr P straight away and broke the good news and said I would be round that evening to see if it worked. (This left Tammy packing for our holiday to the Peak District the next day, but we both wanted to see if we could get this resolved before we left for a week-long holiday and risk delaying things any further.
- It was quite disappointing when a quick visit showed that Broadband was not working; the modem would not synchronise with the exchange.
- This meant I would have to return on the Friday morning, before we left for our holiday.
- Friday 1st August
- Early AM
- Good news – checking my email when I got up – Broadband was officially active, so I dashed over to Waterloo Farm to check again, leaving Tammy to finish off the packing.
- But I was totally gutted when once again the modem would not synchronise – arrgghh!!
- I called up the ISP technical support and they said they would need to do a line check which could take anything up to 24 hours!! So much for having it working before our holiday, and to make it worse, the phone lines at Waterloo Farm are quite old and there are a lot of extensions which could easily have been preventing Broadband from working.
- So I had to leave and make the 4 hour journey up to the Peak District wondering what on earth was wrong and when we would ever find out if we could get Broadband.
- 5.00pm ish – Derbyshire
- The line check has shown ‘nothing is wrong’ so the problem must be in the property. I was starting to lose the plot a little now. I called an independent phone engineer, Roger, who I had already spoken to previously, to ask for advice. He said he was on his way home and could call into Waterloo Farm and take a look. A hurried call to Mr P and I managed to hook the two up.
- About an hour later had a call from Roger to say that he had cut out all of the old phone extensions and left only the master socket connected, but it still would not work – my heart totally sank.
- BUT, while I was on the phone to Roger I could see Mr P trying to call me. When I picked it up he was raving that it was WORKING!!! I could not quite believe him to be honest. But he said he had a friend round who had a laptop, and he thought the synchronising light had stopped flashing, so he told him to plug it in and try it – and it worked!!! NOW WHAT?!
- 8.30pm – Derbyshire
- I left Derbyshire to return to Norfolk, as I had to see it working for myself. This might seem a little crazy, but I was not prepared to give up now. If it meant we could exchange and complete a week earlier it would be worth it!
- 11.45pm – Norfolk
- IT WORKS!!! Mr P was quite right, we were both so excited and pleased to see it working. It felt like quite an adventure and was worth every penny in petrol costs.
- Saturday 2nd August, 5.00am – Derbyshire
- After a strong coffee and short break the adrenaline rush of the good news was easily enough to carry me safely back to the Peak District. The roads were deserted and the journey was much quicker. To be honest I think I smiled all the way – it looks like we have done it, we have finally found our country home!!
I am actually rather proud at my dogged determination to see this through and resolved. There were times when I quite frankly wanted to give up and move onto the next house. But, this time I would not ‘let it lie’ and so I am so pleased that I persevered and got the right result in the end.
I am now tired and a bit shell shocked but the truth of the matter is – we can BUY Waterloo Farm!!
Tags: ADSL Broadband, DACS Removal, Rural Broadband, Waterloo Farm
Categories: Finding our Home in the Country