Broadband ISP Aquiss Blast CityFibre in Complaint Over Poor UK Support
Shropshire-based independent UK ISP Aquiss has notified their customers of concerns that dealing with one of the country’s largest alternative broadband networks, CityFibre, has recently become “incredibly difficult” after the alternative network let a sizeable number of staff go in recent redundancies.
Just for some context. CityFibre’s 10Gbps capable full fibre (FTTP / XGS-PON) based broadband network currently covers over 4.7 million UK premises (4.5m Ready for Service) and they aspire to reach 8 million premises in the future. The FTTP network is supported by UK ISPs such as Vodafone, TalkTalk, Zen Internet, Sky Broadband and many more, such as Aquiss, which sell related products on to homes and businesses.
However, CityFibre continues to carry a lot of debt (c.£3.7 billion net debt) and still faces many of the same pressures as other network operators (e.g. high interest rates, rising build costs and competition), which in recent times has caused quite a few redundancies (here). But Aquiss complains that the latest round of job cuts appears to have significantly impacted CityFibre’s ability to support partners.
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According to a 7th July 2026 post – seen by ISPreview – to customers by the Managing Director (MD) of Aquiss, Martin Pitt, CityFibre has now become “almost impossible to reach on the phone“, with updates to support and new service installations being delayed or having to be “chased extensively and appointments being booked and missed, cancelled by AI decisions“.
Naturally end-customers don’t usually see this side of things and so the ISP’s staff are the ones that take the flak when things go wrong. Suffice to say, it appears as if Aquiss has finally had enough.
Our [Aquiss] Statement – Cityfibre
We want to be open with you all.
At the end of June, in order for Cityfibre to restructure their business, they let go of a large percentage of their staff and in doing so, let a huge amount of good talent go.
Since this time, we are finding that dealing with Cityfibre has become incredibly difficult, almost impossible to reach on the phone, updates to support and new provisions delayed or having to be chased extensively and appointments being booked and missed, cancelled by AI decisions. We have to call it what it is, poor decision making by their management (who remain in posts for the most part).
Their decision is putting an increased pressure on the Aquiss team, who are getting it in the ear when we are not coming back with positive updates in timely fashion. Staff are feeling it.
Cityfibre have great products, but presently without the love and support it deserves, there could be some pain for some time whilst we establish adjusted operations of business with them.
Martin Pitt
Managing Director
Aquiss are not the only retail internet provider to raise gripes about CityFibre’s recent performance, although thus far most of the others we’ve seen have preferred to stay below the public radar. But clearly for Aquiss the frustrations have gone too far, and they’re now calling out CityFibre’s performance, perhaps in the hope that doing so might improve the situation.
A CityFibre spokesperson told ISPreview:
“Martin is right that some fantastic colleagues have recently left CityFibre as we re-organise the business and get ready for our next phase of growth, but what hasn’t changed is the importance we place on our customer service and we would love to speak to Martin and resolve whatever problem he is currently experiencing.”
One key point in all this is that Aquiss are one of CityFibre’s off-net Entanet partners, which regular readers may recall is in the process of transitioning to new ownership under Tom O’Hagan (here). CityFibre have made clear that they intend to 100% support every partner throughout this transition, either through continued CityFibre support, from the Entanet team, or a combination of both. But clearly there are some issues that will hopefully soon be resolved.
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Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
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@Mark – Aquiss aren’t a direct customer for FTTH – they go via Velox.
Also the people unfortunately made redundant left last week. I doubt the impact would be seen this quickly so perhaps there’s something else going on.
@Anon If our services taken via Velox was our focus of concern, I would have included that within my statement. For complete clarity, Velox are a superb business to work with. A network partner to retail relationship should be inclusive, to which we get from Velox.
I don’t know make statements likely, but when impact is on our customers, then as a Director, my focus is ensuring our customers is our highest priority. I wished your 2nd sentence was a true reflection, sadly it’s not. Impact was felt the moment the latest round of staff departures concluded on June 30th.
Martin Pitt
Managing Director
@Martin – June 30th was last week so my 2nd sentence was correct.
Given you have no relationship with Cityfibre for residential services which services ere you having problems phoning Cityfibre directly about then? Or this just what Velox are telling you?
All requests, orders, and escalations have to go through Velox, as Aquiss is not a direct partner with CityFibre. With that in mind I very much doubt he has the access to call them. They operate purely as a Layer 3 reseller of Velox’s service. This means any upgrades, fault fixes, or network improvements that Aquiss claims to be doing are actually being performed by Velox – Aquiss has no independent access or relationship with the underlying CityFibre network.
I think CityFibre are going through some rough times and laying people off always makes it harder. Just look on Reddit and forums it seems ex-employees are exposing what is going on.
“almost impossible to reach on the phone”
Is this perhaps because Aquiss aren’t actually a customer of Cityfibre and they are now being forced to go through the reseller (Velox) they buy from?
Ironic.
I’ve just had Aquiss cancel my service without me asking to*, after spending 2 weeks troubleshooting issues on SoGEA, and buying 4 different routers because their system kept telling them it was an issue with my equipment.
*I asked if it was possible to, as their support team were going round in circles with me, giving my various instructions to turn off Smart WiFi/IPV6, despite router logs showing DSL disconnects.
I only found out about the disconnection because I called up for more support, and was told it was being disconnected the next day anyway.
@C I’m completely aware of your case, in great detail. Repeatedly, you were asked by us to stop playing with your setup, whilst we investigated a consistent “User Request” PPP drop from hardware your side. We struggled to get you to leave things alone, only to find you had once again changed this whilst we were way collecting information and evidence.
I have to say with the deepest of respects, it gets to a point where we have to draw a line that we can’t service a customer requirements.
“I only found out about the disconnection because I called up for more support”. Not true at all, you requested the service to be cancelled, not us. We acted upon your request and released you from your contract. Do feel free to post the content of your email that you sent us on 07/07/2026 @ 9:36pm and our confirmation that we were processing your cease request, at 08/07/2026 @ 09:00am (to complete this morning).
So yes, C, it is very ironic.
What a defensive reply, Martin.
(Based on what I can see) The customer explained they only asked if cancellation was possible after two weeks of circular support on their SoGEA issues – not that they formally requested to be cut off immediately. Yet Aquiss went ahead and cancelled the service anyway.
They spent weeks troubleshooting, bought four different routers because your team kept blaming their equipment, and only found out the line was being disconnected the next day when they called for more help.
Turning a frustrated “is cancellation even an option?” into an instant cease request, while being this combative in public, doesn’t reflect well on Aquiss.
The irony is pretty clear.
This is what I find wild about the Internet.
Someone commenting on something they have no real idea about? Only C & Martin know what’s in the emails that have been exchanged, yet, you’ve managed to side with the customer (C), without actually seeing anything that proves they are the one in the right?