Tenant Installed Fibre Without Homeowners Permission

[Vision]

Hi, has anyone experienced tenants installing fibre without the homeowners permission? The situation is that on a property inspection we find fibre installed but the routing is not our preference. Tenants have advised they signed an instalment agreement but didn't note they needed the homeowners permission on the form.

I'm about to tackle Chorus, surely Chorus do checks as to whom the property owners is? We are happy to have fibre to the property but not the routing.
Do you feel we have grounds to get Chorus back to re route?

Thanks for comments.

[JimNic]

Chorus don't check who owns each property.

They would have asked the tenants with the likes if they are the owners, if not then do they have the owners permission etc.

That's all they asked me on the rentals I have been in.

The ISP would've had something in the email as well when signing up to fibre saying the tenants need owners permission.

More than likely the tenants would've BS to chorus saying they had permission or they own the place.

Don't quote me on this but think with the new rules on the fibre installation, all chorus needs is just verbal confirmation these days.

[Don't believe the Hype]

Good luck getting anything from chorus. If you get this resolved satisfactorily I will hire you to handle my communication with them

[fuzzlevalve]

Been through this twice. Chorus must have your consent to install in the home but they just changed the law so they can install it to your home, say on a shared driveway, without any consent. So if installed in the home they must have your signature or you can make them remove it. Took us 4 months to get a block of flats completely rewired when they didn't get it authorised and did an awful job. But they did fix it.

[SimonW]

I work for Spark Digital in the fibre provisioning space so I have a lot of experience with the consenting process, both prior to and since the recent Land Access Reforms.

Where a tenanted property is standalone (ie not on a shared driveway, not part of a body corporate or cross-lease), there is no requirement for Chorus to gain consent direct from the owner. BUT (and it's a big one) Chorus does ask the end customer to sign a copy of the Chorus End User Terms (EUT) document before any installation work commences.

The EUT document is in two parts. The first page outlines the specific types of work that will take place at this property and specifically asks the occupant if they own the property. If no, a second question specifically asks "has the signatory obtained the approval of the owner of the property for the installation works on or at the property?"

The second page of the EUT document also contains the following clause:
"If you do not own your property, you must ensure that the owner of the property approves the installation, location, access, operation and ownership of our network by us at the property"

So in essence, the tenant is responsible for contacting their landlord in advance to advise that they wish to get fibre installed, and to provide the landlord a copy of the site scope document once the scope has been completed by the Chorus subcontractor. The Scope document clearly outlines the method of installation that will be deployed onsite, and it is the tenant's responsibility to seek the landlord's agreement for this work to proceed BEFORE signing the Chorus EUT document. Chorus is not obliged to confirm that the landlord approves of the work as the tenant has already indicated this is the case by signing the form. Chorus are therefore indemnified by the tenant for any work completed onsite for which the landlord was not consulted.

So in this case, your beef is squarely with the tenant and the tenant alone as they have signed a document indicating that the landlord was aware and approved of the fibre installation. I'd suggest you approach the tenant and ask them to provide their copy of the EUT. If they are not forthcoming, Chorus may be able to provide a copy to you. Either way, the tenant will be liable for the cost of moving any fibre network that has been installed in a manner that the landowner does not agree with.

Bear in mind that all fibre installations are for the moment 100% subsidised by Crown Fibre Holdings and Chorus, but the actual baseline cost can be up to $3000 for a standard installation. However the cost of relocating network after the fact is not subsidised, so the tenant is potentially up for a bill that could easily exceed several hundred dollars. The base price for a move of equipment (ie just to get a Chorus person to the site to assess what is required) is $300.

I hope this information is helpful. For your reference, here is a blank (sample) Chorus EUT agreement.

Bear in mind that other fibre companies service specific areas and each has their own process:
Greater Christchurch: Enable Networks Ltd
Hamilton, Tauranga etc: UltraFast Fibre Ltd
Whangarei: Northpower Ltd
Rest of NZ: Chorus Ltd

[Don't believe the Hype]

Thanks for that Simon. Really helpful to see this shared on PT.

[SimonW]

Further to my previous post, I thought I might as well provide further information, this time for properties that ARE on a shared driveway, in a multi-dwelling building, or cross-lease.

Terminology:
MDU = Multi Dwelling Unit (a building of multiple occupancy - this could be a unit titled apartment block, a set of cross-leased flats, duplexes, terraced housing, townhouses etc)
ROW = Right Of Way (any dwelling which shares a common accessway with neighbours, with either fractional ownership of the drive or a legally recognised easement)
LFC = Local Fibre Company (this could be Chorus, Enable etc)

Preface: Up until recently, any occupant who wanted to have fibre installed, and whose dwelling was part of an MDU or ROW, was required (through their LFC) to get written consent from all the other owners with an interest in the driveway, land (or buildings on shared land), even if the neighbours appeared to not be directly affected. This situation highlighted some "neighbours at war" type scenarios. Some property owners who for whatever reason may not have gotten along with their neighbours could effectively block fibre installations simply by taking no action. If they ignored the consent letter, the fibre installation for their neighbours simply could not proceed. Other fibre orders had to be cancelled simply because some property owners were simply too lazy to respond, or just didn't care. In other instances, absentee overseas owners proved nigh on impossible to contact. And for others, they just didn't want to see any trace of the fibre network on their property. Chorus and other fibre network owners such as Enable Networks, Northpower and UFF had pretty dismal installation completion rates due to the "no response, no consent" setup of the previous regime.

Land Access Reforms: After a period of consultation, the Telecommunications (Property Access And Other Matters) Amendment Bill was tabled in Parliament and eventually passed Royal Ascent stage in April 2017. The Bill (and subsequent Act of the same name) seeks to remove onerous consenting procedures where it is deemed that fibre installations would have very low or low impact to neighbouring property owners.

Parties: Chorus is so far the only LFC to sign up to the new consenting framework, possibly due to the reasonably high compliance costs of the new regime (which includes formation of an industry funded dispute resolution service which is run at arms length by an independent company - Utilities Disputes Ltd). It is expected however that the other major fibre network operators will eventually sign up to this scheme.

Consent Categories:

Category One: Simple low impact work e.g. fibre buried in soil or fence-mounted cabling etc
Methods that have no lasting impacts on property, such as those that only disturb grass or other soft surfaces. For these installations a statutory right will be provided for a network operator to get on with the install after providing five working days’ notice. This is estimated to cover about 37 per cent of installations in shared driveways.

Category Two: Medium impact work e.g. fibre in slot trenches or attached to exterior of MDU buildings in ducts etc
Methods that have some lasting impact on property, such as drilling a cable underground and leaving small pot holes to access the network every 10 metres or so. For these installations neighbours will be provided with a high-level design and given 15 working days to object on a limited number of grounds. If they do not object, they will be deemed to have consented. Category two is estimated to cover off approximately 51 per cent of installations in shared driveways/rights of way.
Specific Grounds For Objection:
Where ownership of the affected land is in dispute
Where fibre installation will have a material negative impact on the property value (must supply evidence)
Where installation will unreasonably impact on a person's enjoyment of the property, or worsen an existing problem (visual impact will NOT be considered)
Where installation would impede a person's plan for development/redevelopment of the property within a certain timeframe
Where an easement exists and a party to that easement can demonstrate that the fibre installation would have an enduring impact on the terms/conditions of that easement

Category Three: High impact work e.g. more extensive trenches in concrete driveways etc - will require the same written consent as today.
Remaining 12 per cent of installation methods that are more invasive than these new categories will continue to be subject the existing requirement whereby all parties need to provide their consent.

If you have read this far, I commend you! I am happy to answer any questions you may have. Bear in mind that every property is different so no one rule will apply to any given property. Upon submission of an order for a specific address, the local LFC will dispatch a technician to scope the job and determine what work is required, who might be affected, and at this time the order will be classified into one of the categories above.

[Vision]

Many thanks for the informative comments, very helpful. Much appreciated.

[ATM]

Dear SimonW,
this is very informative and useful. thanks. I have another question and I wonder whether you have information.
One of my properties is a unit with a long shared drive way and has 2 shared power poles and 1 telephone pole. One of the poles (pole no.3) sits in the private backyard of one of the units. That pole is used to provide only telephone services to all other units as well as a nearby house. If fibre is installed, can the owner of the unit object to the fibre connector (whatever it is called) installed on that third pole? Can the owner of the unit request Chorus to relocate the third pole (which is owned by Chorus) to be out of the private backyard? Thanks.

[SimonW]

Dear SimonW,
this is very informative and useful. thanks. I have another question and I wonder whether you have information.
One of my properties is a unit with a long shared drive way and has 2 shared power poles and 1 telephone pole. One of the poles (pole no.3) sits in the private backyard of one of the units. That pole is used to provide only telephone services to all other units as well as a nearby house. If fibre is installed, can the owner of the unit object to the fibre connector (whatever it is called) installed on that third pole? Can the owner of the unit request Chorus to relocate the third pole (which is owned by Chorus) to be out of the private backyard? Thanks.

Hi ATM,

I think this is pretty straightforward - although it's always a bit hard without actually seeing the property. But from what you've said this should be a pretty easy installation however there are a couple of points to make:

Chorus operates on a "like for like" basis. What this means is that the fibre installation must follow the same route as any existing copper phone wiring - unless the customer or landowner(s) wish to pay for existing overhead services to be placed underground.
As a general rule, Chorus does not commit "aerial trespass" - this is where an overhead cable crosses over the top of another person's private (exclusive) property. In such cases an easement has usually been put in place for this. You have stated that the 3rd pole that sits on private property is owned by Chorus, so it's likely that an easement was granted for that already, so the installation of fibre would be deemed to fall under existing rights usage - I don't think the property owner would have any grounds to object to the fibre being installed on that pole.
Another factor to consider is that fibre cabling is very unobtrusive. Chorus can quite often remove an existing aerial copper cable and replace it with a hybrid cable - this is a copper line and fibre line combined on one strand. So essentially the property owners are unlikely to notice any visual difference.

The property owner could in theory ask for Chorus to move that pole off their property, however that property owner would likely have to pay for it. Again this is because the pole will have an easement permitting its presence on their land. This provides legal protection to that pole which really can't be revoked unless the party wishing to get rid of it pays for the alternative.

[PTWhatAGreatForum]

The OP sounds like the sort of person who thinks tenants are sub-human and should stay in the dark ages.

It's an upgrade. You didn't pay for it. Who cares?

[fuzzlevalve]

You care because the way they install is atrocious. They do anything to reduce cost and timeframe. Tot he extent where they run conduit for example along a falling down fence. And the real kicker is you are liable for any damage to their equipment regardless of how poorly installed it is. Took us months to get someone senior enough to fix 2 of ours. Since then we discovered one of our tenants was a Chorus installer and all the rest have been primo.

NOTE they also try to force you to accept internal installation backing on to the outside box, regardless of how silly the location might be.

[PTWhatAGreatForum]

In the Philippines, one has to bribe, opps I mean incentivise, the installer to do the job.

[Sportsvee]

The OP sounds like the sort of person who thinks tenants are sub-human and should stay in the dark ages.

Where did you read that?

In the Philippines, one has to bribe, opps I mean incentivise, the installer to do the job.

Good thing we're not in the Philippines.

[ATM]

Thanks, SimionW, for informative comments. ATM