I first heard about Community Fibre when they dropped a leaflet through my letterbox back in August 2022.
Waited and waited and even phoned them last year to ask and was told by May but still nothing up to today.
In the meantime, in October 2022, we heard from Open Infra who promised on a call for residents here (Cockfosters, the Charles Church development off Chalk Lane) that they would be live by the end of 2022 which was clearly a lie. Lots of their very pushy salesmen called over the years (saying e.g. if you don't sign up NOW you won't get free installation etc) but we were waiting for Community Fibre and said no.
Most recently was earlier this week when the Open Infra salesman on the doorstep claimed that Openreach would be withdrawing FTTC so if we didn't sign up with them, we'd end up with no Internet service! Wasn't bothered to challenge him on this. When asked about timing, he said we could get it "tomorrow" as they're already live in the area which sounded ridiculous. Sent him away with a flea in his ear.
The following day (yesterday), I then read on here about Community Fibre running out of money and stopping new builds! So I reluctantly signed up online for Open Infra on the basis that something at some point in the future perhaps is better than nothing. I also read the small print about when I could cancel and if I did, what I'd be liable for (worse comes to the worse, I could just take their service for the minimum contract period and that would be the extent of my losses).
I was therefore very suprised to have an Open Infra engineer turn up today to check whether the ducting is suitable for my house. He did and said it's OK, they're not live yet (due to a hitch which we said would be resolved by the end of next week) and in the meantime, booked me in for installation of the boxes next Monday (which he said would be phase 1 of the install). He said phase 2 (running the fibre to the box) would take place shortly afterwards and the final phase 3 (someone turning up with a router and installing) would be around when they go live.
I know I probably shouldn't count my chickens until they've hatched but I take back all the thoughts I've had over the years about them being dodgy, economical with the truth and hard selling charlatans!
Assuming all goes well, my Internet service should go from A&A dual line bonded FTTC (80 / 15 for £130+ / month) to Open Infra (900 / 900 for £35.90 / month; 24-month minimum period; free for first 4 months)!