Residents in the Surrey Hills have installed their own broadband network after traditional telecoms providers failed to connect their homes.

Locals have struggled with sluggish broadband for years - plagued by phone calls cutting out and constantly buffering Wi-Fi.

They believe they have been "forgotten" by big companies, who focus on easier-to-connect towns and deem their villages "too rural to deal with".

Former investment banker Anthony Townsend took matters into his own hands after being inspired by a community organisation called Broadband for Rural North (B4RN).

B4RN had started laying fibre optic cable to thousands of homes without internet in Cumbria, installing underground cabling in gardens and fields.

The founder, Barry Forde, gave his blueprints to Mr Townsend for free - and Broadband for Surrey Hills (B4SH) was born.

B4SH now has 600 customers enjoying speeds of up to 10GBps, with households paying £45 per month and businesses £90.

The network circumvents planning restrictions by routing cables through gardens and private land rather than the road network, saving time and money.

Mr Townsend said: "The broadband here used to be so slow that sending a pigeon would have actually been faster than sending an email.

"The best you could get, on a really good day, would be 10 Mbps.

"And it's because the Surrey Hills have been forgotten by the major telecoms companies - who have always opted for the easy-to-do places.

"So I was talking to a friend about it and he said to me: 'Have you ever considered doing it yourself?' And then told me about B4RN.

"I spoke to Mr Forde - and he gave me his designs for free. I couldn't believe it. I just thought: 'This doesn't happen?'

"But it's because it's all community-based. No one is doing it for any other reason.

"So we launched B4SH and now we provide broadband to over 600 homes. It's a super-fast, state-of-the-art network - with an internet speed of 10GBps.

"One customer, who works three days a week in Canary Wharf and two days a week here in Surrey, says his Internet at home is better than in the office."

B4SH is run by a combination of employees and volunteers, and is a non-profit organisation.

They provide free broadband to designated 'community assets' - such as schools, churches, and village halls - and offer their services to everyone living in "isolated rural communities" in the Surrey Hills.

B4SH works by laying a fully fibre network in underground cabling - all of which runs through people's gardens and fields, rather than down roads.

This means they need permission from homeowners and landowners rather than from councils - which has so far proved effective as the majority of locals are happy to help the community project.

Customers are charged varying amounts to get connected. Some are free, if they do their own garden digs - B4SH provides the ducts - or they can ask for a quote to do the work.

No garden is the same so there’s no fixed charge.

B4SH says the network starts in the village of Albury, where it is connected to a third-party dark fibre provider connected to London - where they can connect with the world wide web..

The current network extends from Albury in the north to Shamley Green and Winterfold in the south, Wonersh in the west and Peaslake in the east - covering around 250km of underground cabling.

Nick Wells, 78, from Peaslake, is both a B4SH volunteer and customer - and says his broadband was revolutionised when he switched to B4SH.

He said: "When we were with our old provider, our internet was truly awful.

"Everything took so much time, there was lots of buffering... You actually forget how annoying it used to be.

"But now, everything is astonishingly fast.

"It makes the small things simple. I can download my morning newspaper in seconds.

"Or, if I'm leaving the house and I realise I forgot to do something, I can sort it then and there.

"It's not adding ages of waiting to my day."

Mr Wells said he knew he had to get involved in B4SH once he realised how Surrey was being "left behind" by big tech providers.

The former City worker said: "I realised that much of Surrey was being left behind.

"We have lots of remote, rural areas which are simply not a natural target for a large telecoms company.

"They want to go for easy-to-reach houses - and not places where there are only a few homes.

"But through B4SH, we've come together as a community to create this project that can help everyone.

"I volunteer and often chat to landowners about going through their fields. People are generally happy to help - because it's all community based."

Another B4SH customer is Ben Smith, 26, who works at local staple Peaslake Stores.

They decided to make the jump to B4SH after the telecoms industry announced its plans to switch from analogue to digital landlines.

While this is supposed to represent an upgrade, there are certain rural areas where digital landlines do not work - meaning Peaslake Stores would be left without a connection.

B4SH was the only provider to offer an alternative.

Ben said: "It was the change from analogue to digital which made us look elsewhere, as some remote places like here can only be reached by analogue.

"The traditional broadband providers weren't offering any alternatives - so we were just going to lose connection.

"But B4SH approached us and said they could do it.

"It was really easy. It was installed quickly and there was no installation fee.

"And when we had some issues - an engineer was here within 40 minutes and even gave me his personal number should I need him again.

"I think that's representative of it as a community company. You know, I see the volunteers around. They come into the shop.

"Everyone's local."

One Surrey Hills resident who is excited to soon switch over to B4SH is Geraldine Firth, 66, who for years has struggled with connection in her remote Albury home.

The mum, who lives with her partner, her daughter, and her daughter's boyfriend, said: "At the moment, mobile connection is worse than ever.

"If you're on a call, it just breaks off. There's never more than one bar.

"A lot of networks don't work at all here. It's almost like the companies see us as too much to deal with - because we're too rural.

"And you just can't have that nowadays. Life is chaos when you don't have broadband."

B4SH is currently installing Geraldine's broadband - and it should be up and running within the next few days.

The accountant said: "We're all pretty excited. It's just such a relief."

B4SH is classed as a community benefit society, and is regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority.

It said it is not for profit in that any profit is ploughed back into the community and, at this point, the money is used to extend the network.

The company is owned by the shareholders, who are almost entirely customers, it said.