Hi all, I'm new to this board but have lived in Valencia for two years.
Be warned about phone availability and ADSL! We rented a property when we arrived in Valencia on the assumption and understanding that there was a phone line. Guess what, there wasn't, however our agent managed to get one installed within a week, but no chance of ADSL.
Whilst searching for our own property, it became apparent that not all properties had a phone line, let alone the possibilty of broadband! We then started meeting people who had waited over two years for a phone and are still waiting! We finally fell in love with a property that we were told had a phone and bought it. It turned out that it had a Radiophone and internet access was lousy. could hardly send e-mails, let alone work on the net. We managed to get it upgraded to a Digital "TRAC" phone which allowed access at UK dial-up speeds, still not satisfactory for someone who needs to work on the net though.
Although there are hundreds of properties nearby, we are the only ones with any sort of phone apart from a mobile. The local residents, both English and Spanish have been bombarding Telefonica for years to install phone lines but they either refuse, or offer to put people on a waiting list which is years long! Even if you do eventually get a phone, the chances of having broadband are very slim. We even got the local Mayor involved to no avail.
We eventually gave up with Telefonica, and searched for a satellite supplier for either phones or Broadband.
You can find a "Stand-alone" set-up to give you this but it's very expensive. Prices start at around €2000 for the equipment and about €100 per month rental! If you are technically minded, you may be able to configure this for use with several neighbours and share the cost, but you'll also be sharing the bandwidth which will slow down the connection.
We found a supplier to give us (a group of residents) a networked two-way satellite connection, they needed a minimum number of people but charged €140 odd for the installation and kit and about €40 per month. We have individual connection speeds of roughly 512k, but can use the connection as a telephone either with a dedicated adapter or using software like Skype (www.skype.com) with a mic and headphones. It actually works quite well, outgoing calls are cheap worldwide and you can even have a london phone number.
Hope this helps someone out there, please feel free to contact me for any more details through
info@valencia-direct.com
Regards
Tim
Spain - British Expat Forum
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