Before we begin construction to your property, you will need to complete the Property Access Consent Form or call our Customer Care Team at 406-541-5000.

Blackfoot currently offers services over a network of both fiber optic and copper cables. Some of the copper cables have been buried in the ground for more than 30 years, which is near the end of their useful life, and need to be replaced. Even if your copper service is working fine today, it needs to be replaced in the coming years as it will likely begin to fail. This project is a commitment Blackfoot is making to its Cooperative members to ensure they have continued access to affordable and reliable services for decades to come.

When you fill out our Property Access Consent Form, we ask details regarding your property to ensure we have a clear understanding of your yard and landscaping. After we plow the fiber drop, we will do our best to restore your property to its original condition, including planting new grass seed for lawns.

Your current service will not be impacted during the construction phase. You will experience Blackfoot construction people on your property for a day or two as they plow the fiber drop directly to your home. At some point after construction (which may be several months), you will be contacted by a Blackfoot service representative to schedule a “cut-over” inside your home or business. This mean your services will be cut-over from the copper network to the fiber network. This process usually only takes a couple of hours, but during that brief time, your service may be unavailable.

Blackfoot’s plan is to construct the fiber drops to all locations within an area first. Once that is complete, we will begin scheduling times when we can enter your home or business to install a new WiFi modem and disconnect your home or business from the copper network and connect it to the fiber network. This may not occur until several months after we have plowed the fiber drop. In the meantime, your existing Blackfoot service will work just as it always has.

Yes. As this is a copper replacement project, we will be decommissioning our current copper network at some point in the future. Once fiber is installed to your location, our copper network will be shut down and no longer provide service.

We are focusing on areas where our copper network is the oldest first. We will replace this copper in the most densely populated areas fist. This will cover 80% to 90% of all locations in each area. After we have replaced the oldest and most dense portions of an area, our goal is to return to those remaining areas and connect them to the new fiber network.

Yes! Sign up for Blackfoot email updates here. Look for more details via email, letters, newspaper ads, community events and other communications in the coming months.

As part of the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund bidding process, Blackfoot was chosen as one of the winners to deliver broadband service to specific unserved and underserved service areas.

Our RDOF bid was for specific areas within our service territory and following strict FCC guidelines, we are building to these areas only at this time. As new public and private funding opportunities become available, Blackfoot will take advantage of these opportunities to bring our service to new areas.

As of February 1, 2021, we are finalizing our construction designs and planning. We then submit this data to the FCC for final approval. Once our planning is complete, we will publish our schedule at BlackfootCommunications.com/NetworkUpgrades and on our news page at BlackfootCommunications.com/News. Currently, we anticipate turning up our first customers as part of this project in the Georgetown Lake area in 2022.

Blackfoot is only one of dozens of companies providing broadband services in Montana. The areas we are building out as part of this project are generally adjacent to our existing service territory, making it more practically and financially feasible for us to build out to these areas.

As part of this RDOF bidding process, Blackfoot is committed to building fiber to the specific areas Blackfoot won during the bidding process. Fiber has many long-lasting benefits, including:

• Greater bandwidth: More voice and internet traffic can travel across fiber than other technologies (This is great for streaming videos, working from home, remote education and more)
• Faster speeds: More voice and internet traffic can travel across fiber faster than other technologies (No more waiting for web pages to load and no more videos buffering)
• More reliable: Fiber is less susceptible to weather conditions (With lower bandwidth and greater interference from outside elements, satellite and cellular services can create a poor customer experience)

For additional information on how fiber enables cellular services to deliver voice and internet services to customers, please see this video.

As new funding opportunities become available, fiber will likely be a priority for the FCC and Blackfoot.

Your current Blackfoot service or bill will not be impacted as we build service to these new areas.

Please contact us at 406-541-5000.

Blackfoot Communications is, and always has been, deeply committed to the communities we serve. In 2016, we began an extensive multi-year, multi-million dollar project to replace the aging copper portions of our network with fiber optics. Fiber-based services will ensure the long-term availability of high speed broadband, voice and other advanced services for decades to come.

As we replace our aging copper network with fiber, we will need to construct new fiber drops directly to each of our customer's homes or businesses at no cost. This means we will need to enter your property to plow new fiber lines. Even if your copper-based service works fine today, we still need to plow fiber as we will be decommissioning and shutting off our copper network over the coming months and years.

By accepting or otherwise using the service, you thereby grant Blackfoot the right to construct, repair, upgrade, replace and operate communications cable and facilities on and/or across your property. From time to time Blackfoot may change its services or upgrade its network. If such changes require, you agree to allow Blackfoot access to your location, upon reasonable notification, in order to install necessary equipment or construct facilities capable of supporting your services. Upon completion of any construction or repairs of its communications facilities on your property, Blackfoot shall use its best efforts to restore the property to its pre-construction condition.

As of December 22, 2021, the following copper-based network service areas are currently under construction:

• Montana: St. Ignatius
• Montana: Thompson Falls
• Idaho: Island Park

Please note:

• As requested by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), we are providing notice that we are beginning to plan for portions of our copper-based network to be turned down.
• Our planned schedule and additional details are available in the attached Public Notice No. 001 (PDF).
• Individual service territories have identified retirement dates as provided by Public Notice No. 001 (PDF).
• Depending on your location within the identified service territory, your service may be turned down earlier as the retirement dates provided are for the entire service territory.

The general communications timeline for decommissioning our copper network:

1. Notice of Copper Network End Date is posted on the corporate website. End date to be no sooner than 120 calendar days out from corporate posting.
2. 119 days (or first work day after corporate posted End Date) current customers who have a) not signed consent forms OR b) have not scheduled fiber service completion order will receive an email notifying them of copper network End Date and the pending end of their Blackfoot service unless they a) sign a consent form AND b) schedule a cut over date.
3. 90 calendar days out from posted copper End Date current customers who have a) not signed consent forms OR b) have not scheduled fiber service completion order will be mailed a certified letter notifying them of the copper network End Date and the pending end of their Blackfoot service unless they a) sign a consent form AND b) schedule a cut over date.
4. 60 calendar days out from posted copper End Date current customers who have a) not signed consent forms OR b) have not scheduled fiber service completion order will receive an automated call to their Blackfoot voice line, and any primary contact number on file, notifying them of the copper network End Date and the pending end of their Blackfoot service unless they a) sign a consent form AND b) schedule a cut over date.
5. 30 calendar days out from posted copper End Date current customers who have a) not signed consent forms OR b) have not scheduled fiber service completion order will receive a personal call to their Blackfoot voice line, and/or any primary contact number on file, notifying them of the copper network End Date and the pending end of their Blackfoot service unless they a) sign a consent form AND b) schedule a cut over date.
6. At copper network End Date +1 calendar day, any current customer who has not provided signed consent and/or scheduled a cut over date will have disconnect orders written to cease Blackfoot provided service immediately.