The empty socket

New-builds are where otherwise sensible people cancel a working line because a brochure showed a family on a laptop in a kitchen that does not yet have water. The socket in the cupboard is real. The service is a later sentence. Between those sentences sits a 4G router and a row with a developer.

Ask the site, not the hoarding

• Which network is in the cabinet or the riser — Openreach, CityFibre, Hyperoptic, Virgin, other.
• Whether premises are registered as ready for service.
• Whether a wayleave or a frame is still outstanding.
• Which retailers have already completed installs on the street.

A plot number is not an address. An address is not a live line. Do not skip those steps because the kitchen island is beautiful.

“Fibre included” means ducts, not a contract

Developers sell infrastructure as a lifestyle. You still choose a retailer, you still pay, and the socket can sit dark while the plot is registered. Ask which network is in the cabinet. Ask which retailers have completed on the street. A hoarding with five logos is not a live ONT.

Which plant in the tube

Developer fibre can be Openreach, an alt-net, a duct with nobody home. The socket is not a retailer. Ask who lights it, who retails, whether you may bring your own ISP. Empty is a dated order, not a reason to sit on 4G until the sales office answers. Photograph the socket. Put the plot number on every form. New-build UPRNs are how matches fail.