Posted: 04th Sep, 2010 By: MarkJ

It's been revealed that BT quoted the tiny rural UK village of Erbistock (Wrexham, Wales) a staggering cost of
£550,000 to install broadband for just 80 homes. The village presently resides too far from BT's exchange to receive a good internet service. Luckily BT aren't the only game in town and the local community has a significantly cheaper alternative.
In fact Rutland Telecom (RT), a rival UK ISP, announced in April 2010 that Erbistock would be the next location on its list to benefit from an unbundled 'up to' 40Mbps
Fibre-to-the-Cabinet ( FTTC ) broadband service (
original news). What's more, RT claims the work would only cost £50,000!
Fibre-to-the-Cabinet technology ( FTTC ) delivers a fast fibre optic link to the operators street level cabinets, while the remaining connection (between cabinets and homes) is done using VDSL2 (similar to current ADSL broadband but faster over short distances) through existing copper cable
David Lewis, MD of Rutland Telecom, told the BBC News:
"We've been able to do this work for £50,000. I'm not sure why BT said it would cost so much more, but essentially this is a case of community action and a small company working together. This is now the first Welsh notspot area to receive broadband using this method. We hope to go live in October."
Residents of the village are also attempting to use the new Welsh Broadband Support Scheme, which offers financial help of up to £1,000 per home to those whom reside within a 'not spot' location, to cover the £50k cost. Rutland Telecom has since suggested that BT did not appear to show much interest in Erbistock until they got involved earlier this year.
UPDATE 9th September 2010A little Karma from BT, it seems.