BT FTTP fault "outside home" - 6 days estimated to fix?

Hi

Having a strange issue with my BT Full Fibre 500 product.

Internet connection disappeared this afternoon. Green lights are still steady on the ONT (LAN, PON and Power) but direct Ethernet connection from ONT to a PC confirms no internet connection and "no valid IP configuration".

I logged in to the BT Broadband website (by tethering to a mobile) and selected "test my connection" on my home broadband account. After a few minutes it reported:

"We've found a fault with your broadband line
!
We'll need to send an engineer to fix the issue which is outside your home.
We'll get things sorted.
You don't need to do anything.
Estimated fix time: 27 November 2023 at 6pm"

Is 6 days to fix a total loss of broadband normal, especially since my ONT seems to be synced with a head end somewhere? Any prospect of a bit of monetary compensation for this, and is it automatic or do I need to claim it?

Sounds like hardware fault in the headend and you've been quoted the standard lead time to get a replacement then arrange the planned engineering works to change it out ( usually done during the night to minimise disruption)

Thanks, interesting to hear that 6 days is a standard lead time. Seems a lot for such a crucial and central piece of the network.

I had a dig about the BT website and it seems I should receive £9.33 per day compensation automatically from the third day onwards (will believe that when I see it). It's something but I would much prefer a connection which works.

I'm not convinced by all the marketing insisting that FTTP is more reliable than connections over copper. In over 20 years of using ADSL and FTTC I never had an outage. Five months with FTTP and I've already got a 6 day outage. Perhaps the fibre cable is more durable than copper cable, but the overall service patently isn't!

I also liked knowing where my exchanges and street cabinets were. No idea where my "head end" is now, they seem to keep such information secret.

I think "up to 6 days" would be more likely. If it's just one PON port faulty and your the only one on the PON then it won't treated as urgently as say, a whole headend down . That's just assuming that is the problem and not something else.
If you would like to know where the headend is just need to know which exchange area your in

Edited by witchunt (Wed 22-Nov-23 13:37:26)

In reply to a post by Chardonbleu:

I also liked knowing where my exchanges and street cabinets were. No idea where my "head end" is now, they seem to keep such information secret.

To be fair there's no reason you need to know. It's not like you have a choice in the matter or that it will have any impact on your service.

But your headend will either be your local telephone exchange or if it's a small one the nearest 'decent sized' exchange.

Eg; my headend is probably Banbury exchange for all fibre-based services. My actual exchange is Brackley but that's a small building tucked behind the old Post Office and probably due to be closed at some point.

Edited by Andrue (Wed 22-Nov-23 13:42:48)

In reply to a post by Chardonbleu:

I would much prefer a connection which works.

No doubt BT would say that you should have taken their "Halo 3+" service with included EE failover

In reply to a post by Chardonbleu:

I'm not convinced by all the marketing insisting that FTTP is more reliable than connections over copper. In over 20 years of using ADSL and FTTC I never had an outage. Five months with FTTP and I've already got a 6 day outage. Perhaps the fibre cable is more durable than copper cable, but the overall service patently isn't!

I'm sorry that this has happened to you, but one person's experience is not statistically significant.

Take 1,000 people who are on FTTC, and compare them with the experiences of 1,000 people who are on FTTP, and then you'll get a better picture.

Even better, ask an ISP who has a mix of customers on FTTC and FTTP, what their respective fault rates are.

To be fair to BT, the connection started working at some point today.

I had no further communication from BT about it. I logged into my BT account (using a different connection) during the day and looked at the fault tracker which showed a progress bar one day into a six day fix, but there was also a small bit of tezt saying that my connection should now be working again and to contact them if it wasn't. Turned out that it had indeed started working again!

If you would like to know where the headend is just need to know which exchange area your in

My exchange is (was?) Western WSWES (in Glasgow).

In reply to a post by Chardonbleu:

My exchange is (was?) Western WSWES (in Glasgow).

Your exchange remains Western! It's also parent to at least Maryhill, Drumchapel, Scotstoun, Govan, Bearsden and Milngavie.

Spookily similar situation to the OP.

Where my story differs is I happened to look out across the street and happened to notice an MJ Quinn van a few doors down, wiring up my neighbours for FTTP (same pole). It is roughly at this point our product started to play up, having been perfect for the last 6 months as we were the first house to get it installed (and still the only one up until that day).

The other difference is that it hasn't been exclusively off, we've been having down periods of 5-20 minutes or so, then it comes back up. I don't think the engineer visit was a coincidence.