The Connecting Cheshire Partnership is pleased to announce its Alternative Technology Grant Scheme, partnering with National Broadband Ltd.

Accessing broadband connectivity in today’s day and age is extremely vital as more services transition to digital and self-managed approaches such as NHS and GP access. Unfortunately, despite the investments made to date, several thousand premises across Cheshire, Warrington, and Halton still can’t access high speed fibre broadband, with a small percentage still receiving problematic and very slow speeds on ageing copper landlines.

The Digital Cheshire team who are on hand to support the delivery of fibre broadband provision across the sub region have developed the” Alt-Tech” Grant Scheme. This will allow residents and businesses who still struggle with bad connectivity to receive advice and equipment to enable use of an alternative solutions utilising 4G mobile broadband. The grant scheme itself will cover the equipment and installation of this solution, which also uses an external (mounted on the premises) antenna to obtain the strongest mobile signal possible.

As part of the agreement with National Broadband Ltd, installers will visit the homes of residents who express interest in the scheme, carry out a survey and check that the solution would work in that location (which is expected to be the vast majority of cases). An installation can then be carried out, with the homeowner only being responsible for the monthly service cost which is below £40 per month for a year (further discounted for longer contract durations if required).

Whilst investment into fibre broadband is accelerating through Project Gigabit, Community Voucher Schemes and Commercial deployment across Cheshire, Halton, and Warrington, the introduction of this scheme will act for some users as a stopgap solution. For others, this may act as a longer-term solution whilst fibre plans aren’t currently in place to cover their vicinity.

If you would like to find out more about accessing 4G broadband and benefitting from the Alternative Technology Grant Scheme, please contact the Digital Cheshire team.