Eircom says that fault levels in Donegal remain high as a result of the continued adverse weather conditions.
There are currently over 500 customers without service, and this number could rise as the volume of reported faults continues to increase due to the unprecedented level of sustained severe weather during the past three weeks.
Specifically, damage in the region has been caused by hurricane force high winds, lightning storms and flooding. Customers are encouraged to report faults as soon as possible.
Due to exceptionally high fault volumes in Donegal it could to be three to four days before all existing faults across the county are repaired.
The worst affected areas include coastal areas of the Southeast (Carlow, Kilkenny, Waterford, Wexford), the South and Southwest (Cork, Kerry, Limerick, Clare), the West and Northwest (Galway, Mayo, Sligo, Roscommon, Donegal).
The sustained severe weather over the past two weeks has been unprecedented. During the past fortnight, eircom has restored service to more than 17,000 customers. However, they have received 9,000 new fault reports this past week and 22,000 faults in the past 14 days.
A spokesman said: “Eircom would like to reassure all customers who are currently experiencing a disruption to their telephone and broadband service that we are working as hard as possible to restore service.
“All available technicians have been diverted onto fault repairs.”
eircom currently has 700 repair crews deployed throughout the country, with a plan to mobilise staff from the eastern half of the country to the west to assist with the worst impacted areas.
All available technicians with repair skills have been mobilised to work on individual fault localisation and repair, as well as crews to deal with specific structural damage (cabling and poling).
Customers should log faults on the “Log a Fault” section of our website (www.eircom.ie) or through our automated customer service line 1901. Faults can be reported to either service 24 hours a day, seven days week.