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Shropshire-based independent UK ISP Aquiss has notified their customers of concerns that dealing with one of the country’s largest alternative broadband networks, CityFibre, has recently become “incredibly difficult” after the alternative network let a sizeable number of staff go in recent redundancies.
Just for some context. CityFibre’s 10Gbps capable full fibre (FTTP / XGS-PON) based broadband network currently covers over 4.7 million UK premises (4.5m Ready for Service) and they aspire to reach 8 million premises in the future. The FTTP network is supported by UK ISPs such as Vodafone, TalkTalk, Zen Internet, Sky Broadband and many more, such as Aquiss, which sell related products on to homes and businesses.
However, CityFibre continues to carry a lot of debt (c.£3.7 billion net debt) and still faces many of the same pressures as other network operators (e.g. high interest rates, rising build costs and competition), which in recent times has caused quite a few redundancies (here). But Aquiss complains that the latest round of job cuts appears to have significantly impacted CityFibre’s ability to support partners.
According to a 7th July 2026 post – seen by ISPreview – to customers by the Managing Director (MD) of Aquiss, Martin Pitt, CityFibre has now become “almost impossible to reach on the phone“, with updates to support and new service installations being delayed or having to be “chased extensively and appointments being booked and missed, cancelled by AI decisions“.
Naturally end-customers don’t usually see this side of things and so the ISP’s staff are the ones that take the flak when things go wrong. Suffice to say, it appears as if Aquiss has finally had enough.
Our [Aquiss] Statement – Cityfibre
We want to be open with you all.
At the end of June, in order for Cityfibre to restructure their business, they let go of a large percentage of their staff and in doing so, let a huge amount of good talent go.
Since this time, we are finding that dealing with Cityfibre has become incredibly difficult, almost impossible to reach on the phone, updates to support and new provisions delayed or having to be chased extensively and appointments being booked and missed, cancelled by AI decisions. We have to call it what it is, poor decision making by their management (who remain in posts for the most part).
Their decision is putting an increased pressure on the Aquiss team, who are getting it in the ear when we are not coming back with positive updates in timely fashion. Staff are feeling it.
Cityfibre have great products, but presently without the love and support it deserves, there could be some pain for some time whilst we establish adjusted operations of business with them.
Martin Pitt
Managing Director
Aquiss are not the only retail internet provider to raise gripes about CityFibre’s recent performance, although thus far most of the others we’ve seen have preferred to stay below the public radar. But clearly for Aquiss the frustrations have gone too far, and they’re now calling out CityFibre’s performance, perhaps in the hope that doing so might improve the situation.
A CityFibre spokesperson told ISPreview:
“Martin is right that some fantastic colleagues have recently left CityFibre as we re-organise the business and get ready for our next phase of growth, but what hasn’t changed is the importance we place on our customer service and we would love to speak to Martin and resolve whatever problem he is currently experiencing.”
One key point in all this is that Aquiss are one of CityFibre’s off-net Entanet partners, which regular readers may recall is in the process of transitioning to new ownership under Tom O’Hagan (here). CityFibre have made clear that they intend to 100% support every partner throughout this transition, either through continued CityFibre support, from the Entanet team, or a combination of both. But clearly there are some issues that will hopefully soon be resolved.