What does "blockage in pipework" mean?

[Partha Das]

I am supposed to have NTL broadband installed tomorrow. A few minutes ago I received a text message, presumably from the installer, saying "blockage in pipework outside your property, will now be installed on 19 December" i.e. a full month from now.

Does this mean they will need to dig up? Or does it mean that I am entering into a world of woe? Is it ever going to be installed as there are many horror stories like this.

Thanks...

There is ducting under the pavement outside your house. They pull the cable from the nearest street cabinet, to your front garden, through this ducting. That is what has become blocked, and it will require a visit from a special team to clear the blockage before they can install the cable to your home. This may well involve them digging the street up although I don't know, they may be able to get access to poke something up the pipe to clear it.

When the original infrastructure was installed, the construction teams dug up the pavement & installed a conduit leading from the street cabinet containing the connectors to outside each house local to that cabinet - no cables installed at this point. When they come to install your service they have to be able to connect a cable to the street cab & pull it through the conduit & thence to your property.

Unfortunately in your case the conduit is blocked, probably by over enthusiastic use of concrete during the initial construction, and will need to be cleared, before the cable can be pulled through.

- I'm surprised it will take a month, I had a similar problem that delayed my installation by about a week, but there were a lot more construction teams employed, back then.

All I can suggest is to keep calling to see if the installation can be brought forward, at all? - however, as you don't have to be there when the construction fault is cleared, it isn't as simple as hoping for someone else cancelling, and more likely due to overworked contractors???

<edit> to acknowledge Chris types a lot faster than I do

[altis]

Originally Posted by Partha Das

What does "blockage in pipework" mean?

You need to call upon the services of Salu!

[Partha Das]

Thank you both Chris and Homealone.

I am a bit puzzled by the fact that I had the text (about half an hour ago) the evening before the installation. Did the engineer really come to pre-visit the site; I doubt it very much. I can not verify it as we are both stuck at work on a Friday evening! I will ask my neighbours if they saw an NTL van today.

[altis]

When they did ours, they poked a rope through the duct on the day before. On the actual day of the install all they had to do was pull the cable using the rope.