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Residents fear being cut off after a network provider announced plans to pull its only high-speed wifi service from a rural village.
Hundreds of homes across Stansted and parts of Fairseat could be left with poor internet from next year with no alternative solution currently in sight.
Trooli, a company that specialises in providing high speed internet to rural areas, confirmed it will end its service for the villages later this year, which could mean a drop in internet speeds from 80 mbps to just five.
Those living and working in the areas have said the decision has left them feeling “hopeless”.
Steve Bassi moved to Stansted from London over four years ago in hopes of giving his daughter a better life in the countryside.
He said: “One of the big considerations when moving is always to look at the internet connection.
“Would I have still come to Stansted? Probably not. I need the internet for our business.
“It would have a huge impact on my life if I couldn't do that.”
Like other residents in the village, he relies on the Fibre To The Cabinet (FTTC) connection which uses fibre optic cables and copper wires to provide homes with a bandwidth speed of around 80 megabytes per second and is supplied by Trooli.
The Kings-Hill-based provider - which operated under the name Call Flow Solutions until 2021 - was commissioned by Kent County Council in 2017 to bring FTTC to Stansted as part of its Making Kent Quicker scheme to improve areas which had slow or poor broadband and were not on “existing commercial or market-led plans” for upgrades.
Last month residents received an email from Trooli saying Openreach would be ending its Wholesale Line Rental product at the end of 2025, and so they can no longer provide its FTTC service.
The BT-owned company manages telephone cables and cabinets that connect nearly all homes and businesses in the country to different broadband and telephone networks.
As a result of the move, Trooli said it would be withdrawing from the villages in May - the only alternative will be ADSL, which uses copper telephone lines, offering a speed of just 5 Mbps.
For reference, a minimum of 10 to 25 Mbps is needed to take video calls, download large files and stream videos.
In general, 5 Mbps is sufficient for general browsing.
Steve runs a coffee shop in London with his wife but mainly works from home, and the dad spends a great deal of his time in front of a computer.
He said: “I feel so bullied by these corporations – whether it is Trooli, Openreach, whoever it is – I feel so intimidated that something we have had and used for a long time can just be taken away at a whim.”
After receiving the news from Trooli in March, he called on Tonbridge MP Tom Tugendhat to help the hundreds of homes across Stansted and the surrounding area set to be affected.
The politician wrote to the Trooli’s CEO and soon after, they announced they had reviewed their notice period and felt they had more time to find an improved resolution with Openreach.
But, the service, and the fast wifi, will still finish at the end of the year if no alternative is found.
Openreach currently has a plan in place to bring full-fibre broadband to 25 million homes by December 2025.
But the telecom company confirmed Stansted is not part of these plans as of yet.
Steve said: “We will be able to keep what we have for a while longer but we're still up in the air, we don't know what's happening. Will we ever get high-speed broadband?
“There's a lot of confusion, a lot of misinformation and disinformation.”
The 70-year-old added: “I’ve got no control, no input and feel valueless as far as these corporations are concerned.
“It’s all about money for their shareholders but we are real people and we have to live.
“I feel I am in a corner and I really need to fight my way out but I don’t know if I have the strength to do it anymore – you just feel kind of hopeless.”
KCC said it had not had any involvement in this contract since 2017 when Trooli took over, and would not be in a position to comment on any decisions being considered by the company.
A spokesperson for Trooli said: “We have been in touch with a small number of customers whose broadband service is at threat from Openreach’s Wholesale Line Rental (WLR) switch-off.
“These properties are part of a small group of Call Flow customers whose broadband uses an unusual type of connection which is reliant on Openreach’s copper network.
“Whilst we have had no part in Openreach’s decision to switch off WLR, if it goes ahead as planned, it will no longer be possible for us to provide these properties with a broadband connection.
“These customers were originally informed that their service would be switched off in May.
“However, as the switch-off is not scheduled to take place until the end of the year, we have decided to use this time to continue our attempt to find an improved resolution with Openreach.
“This postponement has been communicated to potentially impacted customers.
“We will, of course, provide further updates to these customers and keep them updated on how our conversations with Openreach progress.”
A spokesperson for Openreach said: “Our build plans are continually being updated.
“People can check what's available at their address at www.openreach.co.uk/ultrafastfullfibre and register to be alerted when they can upgrade.
“For those not yet in any build plans, state-subsidised programmes like Project Gigabit are rolling out nationally. We're making good progress but there's more to come."
