Residents in Tilford have spoken out about their growing frustration with broadband providers after years of false promises and inaction.

The picturesque Surrey village, often ranked among the most desirable places to live in the area, is now facing the reality of digital exclusion.

Villagers say they feel left behind, and that their concerns are not being taken seriously by broadband providers.

With poor mobile signal throughout Tilford, many residents rely heavily on Wi-Fi to work, communicate, and access essential services.

As more services move online, a stable internet connection has become a necessity for daily life.

For those living just over the bridge on Tilford Street, connectivity issues have persisted for years. Despite repeated assurances from providers, some homes continue to remain unconnected.

Resident Charlotte Mathias said: “We live in a small cottage and have had to pay for several boosters and a 5G network for the house just to get service, and it is not cheap.

“I rely upon the Wi-Fi to work, and when the power went out in the village, I had to travel to the Duke of Cambridge pub in Hindhead just to work.

“For my husband’s business in the village, we had to get Starlink just to be able to operate, otherwise we could not have the business here.”

The same issues are regularly reported at the Barley Mow pub, where staff say customers frequently complain about the Wi-Fi.

With limited connectivity and unreliable power, the business sometimes has no choice but to operate on a cash-only basis when tills go offline.

Another resident, who wished to remain anonymous, said: “We have had issues ever since I got my first computer, which was a long time ago, and you can imagine.

“I’m paying £44.99 a month for 15mbps but it has been lower than that, and BT keep putting letters through my door to say I can upgrade to full fibre for the same price, giving me hundreds of mbps, but the infrastructure is not capable of providing that to my house.

If the providers would just do what they were intending and extend the full fibre cable like they were supposed to do in the first place, it would not be an issue—but they just stopped half-way up the street.”

Another resident Abdul Arif said: “I am concerned that if there was an emergency in the village, people would not be able to contact.”

Tilford Parish Councillor Hazik Rahman echoed those concerns.

“The issue is when the town is flooded, as we saw last year in November, or the Wi-Fi goes down,” he said.

“Residents may not be able to contact people in an emergency. We have little mobile signal in the village, and a lot of people use WhatsApp to communicate and work.”

Some residents were fortunate enough to secure access to the Starlink satellite service—but others are now out of luck, as the UK service has reached maximum capacity.