Just to let you know about the Gigabit Voucher Scheme (GBVS), which has been financially matched by East Riding of Yorkshire Council. The aim of the scheme is to help residents and small businesses with poor internet speeds (of which there are sadly many in our rural ward - so this scheme is very important for our area) upgrade to the better internet speed they deserve living in the 21st century.
Residents or small businesses/SME’s (which in this case is defined as, a business who employees less than 249 people and has an annual turnover of less than £44 million a year) with internet speeds of less than 100mbps are entitled to make use of the GBVS. Those that do, need to apply directly to their supplier of choice from a list of suppliers approved by Building Digital UK (BDUK). The supplier of choice then costs the delivery of a connection and applies to BDUK to offset the costs with funding of up to £1500 for residential households or £3500 for business premises put forward by the Government (and in the East Riding this has been matched by ERYC, meaning twice as many people can benefit from this scheme).
There is also a ‘top-up’ scheme available as part of GBVS that will double the funding contribution to households or a business if specific criteria is met, such as if the premises is extremely rural or if internet speeds are extremely poor in that specific area. In some cases it may also be necessary for residents and businesses to contribute towards the cost of the upgrade if the Government/ERYC funding does not cover the full cost of the upgrade, however, I think these will be a very small minority of cases.
Applications to the GBVS must be made by a group of premises (two or more), so the residents who wish to apply for this may need to talk to their neighbours and apply as a pair or even a whole street (the more the better).
Full details of the scheme, who is eligible and how to apply are available here: https://gigabitvoucher.
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