This fairly much mirrors my own experience of trying to get ADSL for work. I can get it here at home in Chichester city centre, but the nursery is in Barnham, and the local exchange (in Yapton) has not been upgraded for ADSL. BT now says that it is not going to upgrade any more exchanges except on a business case (fair enough – you don’t do something unless it pays) which means that around 200 customers have to sign up. I can’t imagine that there are that many people who will pay for it in the Yapton exchange area (which covers Yapton, Barnham and Walberton villages).
BT has recently offered us ADSL via satellite, but the installation costs are nearly £1000 and the rental is much higher than for a terrestial ADSL connection – we simply can not justify the expense. And yet the Internet is important for our business – more and more of our mail order transactions are now conducted over the net, and it is also a valuable promotion tool.
So what help is the Government giving to rural businesses to help us be part of “broadband Britain”. There was supposed to be lots of money being made available to help us get connected, but where has it been spent? The Scottish Assembly has given considerable backing and funds to getting remote parts of Scotland hooked up. Barnham is miles from being remote – and yet we can’t get a service that is available to a small crofter living in Skye.
separating the wanted from the unwanted