tree in front garden leaning against telephone line

magicbastarder

i've a eucalyptus i'm not overly fond of in the front garden - planted by the previous owner - which i recently noticed has a branch visibly leaning against the phone line. it's too high up for me to tackle - i have a lopping saw i'd have done the job with in the absence of the line, as the branch is not massive, but i'm not going to tackle it as is.

is it naive to think that if i rang eircom, they'd send someone round to rectify it? obviously the main concern here would be that they'd leave the tree completely lopsided and make it look even worse.

tampopo

I'd say leave it. Probably only making a trunk call









(sorry)

Luckysasha

Eircom aren't too worried about tres growing in to their network as it doesn't cause earth faults as on esb wires. Just look at the state of the eircom network around the country and you will see how worried they are about trees hitting the wires etc. Best bet is to have a go at topping the tree yourself. Just make sure it is a phone wire and not esb before you start. You can pop a picture up and I will varify it for you if your unsure

Oldtree

magicbastarder wrote: »

i've a eucalyptus i'm not overly fond of in the front garden - planted by the previous owner - which i recently noticed has a branch visibly leaning against the phone line. it's too high up for me to tackle - i have a lopping saw i'd have done the job with in the absence of the line, as the branch is not massive, but i'm not going to tackle it as is.

is it naive to think that if i rang eircom, they'd send someone round to rectify it? obviously the main concern here would be that they'd leave the tree completely lopsided and make it look even worse.

If it's too high for you to tackle, don't!

magicbastarder

ah, it's a branch i'd have had no trouble tackling in the absence of the cable - the cut would have been about 10 foot above the ground, and the cable is about 15 foot up. the branch is not much thicker than my wrist, but the cable is not that substantial so i'm not going to risk it.

kylith

I'd call the ESB in a panic, if I were you. How're you supposed to know if it's an electricity cable or not?

magicbastarder

i'm 90% certain it's the phone, it comes off the same pole as the cable which carries the phone line into our house, and it's too thin looking to be an electricity cable.

kylith

magicbastarder wrote: »

i'm 90% certain it's the phone, it comes off the same pole as the cable which carries the phone line into our house, and it's too thin looking to be an electricity cable.

I wouldn't bother about that if you need to get the branch cut.

You're a member of the public, they cannot expect you to know if it's an electricity cable or not. As an untrained member of the public even if you think it's a phone line you don't know if it's safe to trim the branch or if you'll get killed. Call them out, let the professionals deal with it.

magicbastarder

i decided to try eir first. cannot get through on the phone (1901) as it will only connect me when i provide a phone number, and i am not a customer.

so i decided to try the customer support webchat. having a quite amusing conversation with what i can only assume is a bot, which clearly cannot understand my query and is directing me to 1901.

magicbastarder

well, i finally chased this up, and got a response from eir. the lady i was talking to was pleasant, but the gist was: sod off (she in no way came across like this, the corporate policy seems to be one of sod off).

the official response is that - if the tree is lying against an eir line - i should go through my own service provider, who will then go via the wholesale department in eir, and request the work, which is chargeable.
when i pointed out that my provider is virgin media, who do not use that cable and wouldn't care a jot about someone else's cable, and would refuse to countenance the issue, there was no change in the stance.

all a little odd. i assumed they'd occasionally have crews out dealing with such issues, and i was just contacting them to give them explicit permission to hack away.

i'm half tempted to ring virgin anyway to see what they'd say...

clintondaly

I would be thinking along these lines

GreeBo

I'd be doing something before the tree causes damage that you are liable for.

I had assumed it was a public tree, but if its your tree then you will be liable for any damages.

Shaunoc

magicbastarder wrote: »

i decided to try eir first. cannot get through on the phone (1901) as it will only connect me when i provide a phone number, and i am not a customer.

so i decided to try the customer support webchat. having a quite amusing conversation with what i can only assume is a bot, which clearly cannot understand my query and is directing me to 1901.

if you select # on phone keypad i think, it should bypass that, or so i heard in the past :rolleyes:
failing that smash a few other keys down

magicbastarder

the weird thing is that it seems to be explicit that i cannot request this work myself (even if it is chargeable) - it *has* to come from my service provider, who would be billed for it, so they have that admin overhead to deal with, and will laugh me off the phone if i ask, i'd bet.

jmBuildExt

magicbastarder wrote: »

well, i finally chased this up, and got a response from eir. the lady i was talking to was pleasant, but the gist was: sod off (she in no way came across like this, the corporate policy seems to be one of sod off).

the official response is that - if the tree is lying against an eir line - i should go through my own service provider, who will then go via the wholesale department in eir, and request the work, which is chargeable.
when i pointed out that my provider is virgin media, who do not use that cable and wouldn't care a jot about someone else's cable, and would refuse to countenance the issue, there was no change in the stance.

all a little odd. i assumed they'd occasionally have crews out dealing with such issues, and i was just contacting them to give them explicit permission to hack away.

i'm half tempted to ring virgin anyway to see what they'd say...

afaik (from talking to a guy who came to do our eir installation on the house side) KN networks are actually responsible for the old telecom eireann network and eir are just the service provider... Equivalant to how ESB networks are responsible for the electric and Gas Networks Ireland are responsible for the Gas network.

I've no basis for this other than the fact the guy from KN networks who came to do my installation said that KN networks are responsible for hte network and are needed if I want to make connection to outside cabinet. As an extra, since they have to come out to do whatever they need to do in outside cabinet, they provide the service of installing the user equipment for eir and vodafone.

magicbastarder

i'm also enjoying the irony that the day eir rang me back (after about a two week wait) is the windiest day we've seen here for probably six months.

looksee

Completely off topic, I had eir telling me (officially, in an official printed letter) to ring that 1901 number about my cancelled service, which they had cancelled...they don't recognise numbers from cancelled services. I had to contact them through Boards.

Thud

kylith wrote: »

I'd call the ESB in a panic, if I were you. How're you supposed to know if it's an electricity cable or not?

I think there is a serial number on all esb poles that they will ask for before they come out so don’t think this would work.


If you are sure its a phone line do it yourself.
I had someone shoot a phone line (presume there was a pigeon on it) years ago, took a few weeks to get it fixed, doubt it will be any quicker nowadays.

magicbastarder

i asked an ESB meter reader a few months ago about it; he said there's no chance it's an electricity cable.

New Home

Would you ring one of the fire stations (not 999) and ask them for advice? They probably know who exactly has to deal with stuff like that - e.g., if the tree were a to pose a danger in case of storm (for fire or in case it felled) they'd have to get involved, so they probably know who should be contacted before that happens. (not sure if I'm making much sense, sorry).

coffeyt

1850 245424 is the contact number for the dangerous plant team in eir.
I had an issue with a leaning pole at the end of my garden and am not an
Eir customer.
I contacted that number and they escalated it to the relevant team and got it sorted. (Did take a while but that was due to access being tricky with a split level garden)
I would advise calling after 6pm though as when I first called during the day was advised they only dealt with moving poles.
I tried after 6 and got through to someone who helped (he even advised that it only really gets through to the right dept if you call after 6 as they deal specifically with poles about to come down or affected by trees etc)