A man who recently bought a house in Waterford has been forced to keep renting elsewhere as his new home has no fibre broadband.
Several locations across the country are not included in the National Broadband Plan for fibre broadband – with only 23% of the population being covered.
NBI Chief Executive Peter Hendrick has previously said that all homes and businesses not included in the plan will be fibre-connected in five years.
Martin told Lunchtime Live his dwelling is one of 15 in the current phase of housing with more to come.
"I was fortunate enough to actually buy a new house about three weeks ago," he said.
"I would have been naïve to think a prerequisite of that would have been an internet connection or a fibre internet connection into the premises.
"It's actually turned out that's not the case and it does actually seem to take a while after acquiring the house that you actually get the connection.
"I've tried a couple of times to get in contact with Eir who are responsible for actually connecting the overall development, which unfortunately they haven't responded to."
'Renting where I currently am'
Martin said he has heard of other developments waiting up to a year to be connected to fibre broadband.
"If you look 50 yards up the road from my house there's a housing estate of 100 houses which are all connected," he said.
"It's in a built-up town so it's not an area which the National Broadband rollout is trying to get to."
A Wi-Fi router close up, 21-12-20. Image: Piotr Adamowicz / AlamyMartin said he wants to get an idea of the timeframe.
"The thing for me really is to understand how long that period is going to be," he said.
"Is it going to be three months, six months, potentially a year?
"I actually work from home.... so I rely heavily on actually having a fibre connection for the ability to work.
"It's unfortunate I actually have to continue renting where I currently am, even though I have purchased a house and have mortgage payments.
"I need to have a job to pay for the mortgage... I was naïve probably to think a prerequisite of a new house would be that there'd be an internet connection with it".
What can be done
Newstalk Tech Correspondent Jess Kelly has some advice for people in a similar predicament.
"If you go to Comreg.ie and you put in the Eircode of your property, or your potential property, not only will it tell you what mobile networks cover your area but it'll also tell you about the connectivity in terms of broadband as well," she said.
"When it comes to Martin's situation, you can go on and see what potencial providers would facilitate you".
Jess said a geodirectory file from Open Eir, which manages Ireland's largest wholesale full fibre broadband network, is regularly updated with new builds.
"Every quarter Eir will update their database and identify what properties need to be catered to, what properties are being facilitated by the National Broadband Plan and what properties are outside their zones," she said.
"Hopefully if you manage to talk to a human being within Open Eir they should be able to give you some form of timeline."
Split-screen of an Agri-spread tractor and some broadband wires.Jess said the "massively problematic" issue goes beyond new builds.
"We have homes and businesses in this country that are falling between two stools of the National Broadband Plan intervention area and the fibre provided by commercial providers," she said.
"There are people who are still on shocking speeds and the most frustrating thing is their neighbour two doors down could qualify for fibre.
"It literally comes down to the centimetre on the footpath where you are whether or not you can have fibre," she added.
The NBI rollout will see 569,000 premises able to access the programme, reaching 1.1 million people.
Over 65,000 farms will avail of it, along with 44,000 small businesses and 679 schools.
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