Wait, a ray of hope? What? But, I thought this dream was over? Alas my good reader, it’s not. Thanks to the people at the Chorus NZ twitter account, I’ve been given some hope. A beam of light in the darkness.

This is the email I received:

Hi Dustin,

I am from UCG – We are the service partner for Chorus – the provider of Ultra-Fast Broadband infrastructure as part of national fibre deployment initiated by the government.

We have received an Ultra-fast Broadband Connection request for {my_address}

We are now ready for to organise a site assessment. (How the contractor intends to bring fibre into the property/ site)

We have Scheduled assessment for Wednesday 16th May 2018 @ 9AM (I have also put it in the contractors calendar for now – so that the earliest available slot doesn’t get taken)

Please reply to confirm, the schedule.

To get ready for the construction of your requested service UCG will arrange for a technician to visit the site to investigate fibre access;

At the site assessment it is required that a representative of the owner(s) is available to discuss pathways and recommended routes.

We will need to gain access to the entire property, the communication panel/room and the basement (if applicable).

This person must be able to approve design options such as:

• Location of distribution points (BUDIS)

• Location and use of capping, trunking, access hatches or other visible equipment

• Any underground or external civil works.

Wherever possible the design will use existing ducts and hidden pathways to remain out of sight to minimise visual impact.>

After everything I’ve been through, I was a bit skeptical, but hopeful. Could this be true? It sounded almost too good to be true. I replied right away to let them know I would be available and waiting for the technician. A little bit of back and forth to answer their questions, and I was confirmed for the technician visit

The Visit #

I waited anxiously for the technician to arrive, and recieved a call stating he was in front of my building, promptly at 9 AM on the scoping date. I ran to my balcony, hoping to see him, but my hopes were quickly dashed. He wasn’t there… Was this a sign of how things were going to pan out? I certainly hoped not. I gave him directions and met him at the top of my driveway. He was extremely nice, and ready to get started with the scoping.

I explained to him that I had a previous “scoping” visit, and it hadn’t gone so well. Up to this point, I’d been told there was no fibre to the building, they didn’t have scoping done, consent was needed, and a few other things. I had given up hope, and figured I would work through the process at a later date once they had done some more installs in my building. The technician was very apologetic, and stated it sounded like the previous tech (I believe at another contracting company) hadn’t done his job properly.

I showed Fred (current contractor), the interior, and where I would like the interior point to be completed. He took photos of my hallway, as there is existing conduit there, and it was a possible connection point. We then went around the outside of my building, where he located the fibre drops for all of the buildings. That’s right, no matter what I was told, and the previous contractor had informed Chorus, there were in fact fibre drops at each building. It’s already been run behind the buildings, and 4 points for each building (which houses 4 apartments per building) were already put in place.

Seriously, this was already a much more pleasant experience than the previous contractor.

I walked around with Fred and asked questions relating to the installation, and showed him how our apartment is laid out. He answered all of my questions quickly and professsionally. He was much nicer overall than the previous person as well. In the end, he took measurements and photos, which will be used for scoping (this is much more than the previous tech). I informed him we have access to the ceiling through our apartment, which means they won’t need to put holes in the exterior wall (bonus!), and will make it an easier installation.

At this point, I just have to wait for the scoping to be approved by Chorus first, then given to me to give my apartment manager. I’m extra hopeful at this point. I replied to the person that set up the scheduling, and let them know how great of a job Fred did, and how pleasant it was to work with him. They will be with me for the entire installation process and keeping an eye on it. I also replied to Spark on twitter (through DM) to thank them as well.

Hopefully the proccess is much smoother from here on out. Even after switching to a new provider in the middle, it should be a smooth ride. We’ll see, and I’ll definitely keep updating here.