Optic Fiber installation with Consolidated Communications
- Installation Costs – Consolidated has assured Walpole’s Broadband Committee that a client installing the new fiber service will NOT be charged for installation, (Note that Consolidated reserves the right to charge a small fee ($0.55/ft) for installations more than 150 feet from the pole. but in practice in our town they are not charging for those.) So if you get a bill for installation, give them a call and question it.
The Walpolean 
Anyone who has Consolidated’s Fiber installed wish to comment on whether they are happy, unhappy or offer comments?
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Oops! I just posted a comment that should have read MB not GB!
Hugh Montgomery, sent from my mobile device
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Generally happy – it’s a far cry from the 15/1 DSL connection that was my only non-satellite option before. Consolidated is still Consolidated – they’re used to operating in areas where they have no prospective competition, so the company itself does little to be customer-friendly and stay current with the times. Customer service agents are nice but powerless (“it’s the system, we can’t do anything” is their number one answer), peering agreements are mediocre (hello peak hours congestion), and provided equipment that you’re required to rent even if you don’t use it under the town’s agreement with Consolidated is bottom shelf. So far there’s been one multi-hour outage since early February, and when it happened nobody knew anything until the connection just came back.
All in all, if I had a choice of fiber providers, Consolidated wouldn’t be it. But, given the lack of other options, this is a huge improvement.
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Thank you Ilya for the helpful feedback. Sounds like the old Fairpoint modus operandi.
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I just got the bill for the installation…$1028.27. They did a sloppy job stringing the wire to the house, it loops through a tree instead of following the existing lines. Not happy at the moment.
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Anne, nor should you be happy. Consolidated has promised free installation as long as there is a ‘defined path’ for the fiber, which you clearly have. Also professional installation which I would not expect means looping through the trees. We’ll get this sorted out!
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