MSP Kenneth Gibson has supported businesses who have complained about poor broadband connection speeds in Fairlie.
He has escalated matters by writing to a high level BT complaints team about problems were raised by residents throughout the entire village, and businesses including Maritime Craft Services. Five community councillors have also been affected by the poor broadband speeds.
Charlene Butcher of Maritime Craft Services said: “Since opening our new offices in May 2014 we have had really poor internet connections therefore we decided to place an order for a leased line which would give us guaranteed speeds. We placed the order in March 2015 and as yet are still waiting for BT to carry out the works to install the line, they keep sending dates for the work to be carried out but it never goes ahead.”
Mr Gibson has taken the issue up with BT Wholesale and Ventures High Level Complaints Team.
He said: “Fairlie Community Council raised the issue of poor broadband services in the village. I hope priority will be given to installing the necessary technology into Fairlie. It is obviously a village wide issue.”
Complaints from residents including intermittent coverage and speeds varying on a daily basis, including addresses at The Causeway, Highfield Terrace, Main Street, and Castlepark Drive.
Kathryn Holyrood of the BT Complaints Team said: “I’m sorry to hear of the problems they are having with their broadband service. I have completed testing on the numbers and have also liaised with their broadband service providers. We have now received an update from our supplier Openreach’s high level complaints team and we are now in a position to write a formal response. This will take a few days to be sent due to the current work load on the team.”
The BT Complaints team stated to Mr Gibson that they had been ‘dealing with an extraordinary number of cases’ and thanked him and the people and businesses affected for their patience.
The Scottish Government and its partners are extending high speed fibre broadband to around 95% of Scotland by the end of March 2018, and according to the Digital Scotland website, Fairlie is to benefit from new fibre broadband by the end of December 2016.