For The Curious About Openreach FTTC Delays

There's a nice little tool on the BT Infinity website that puts things into perspective.

http://www.productsandservices.bt.com/consumer/asset...

Then go to your area - it's great as it both shows the original date for the area and the updated one.

In my case I'm looking at Greater London:

30TH MARCH 2011
Acton, Beulah Hill, Bowes Park, Catford, Clapton, Clerkenwell, Colindale, Crouch End, Dulwich, Earls Court, Edgware, Feltham, Finchley, Grove Park, Hammersmith, Harlesden, Kenton Road, Kidbrooke, Kingsbury, Lee Green, Leytonstone, Mill Hill, North Edgware, North Finchley, North Wembley, Northolt, Northwood, Primrose Hill, Ruislip, Rushey Green, South Clapham, Staines, Stanmore, Streatham, Teddington, Twickenham, Wembley, West Drayton, Willesden, Winchmore Hill

30TH JUNE 2011
Beulah Hill, Bowes Park, Clapton, Colindale, Crouch End, Edgware, Forest Hill, Grove Park, Hampstead, Kidbrooke, Kingsland Green, Mill Hill, Molesey, North Edgware, North Wembley, Ruislip, Rushey Green, Streatham, Teddington, Upper Holloway, Wanstead.

30TH SEP 2011
Acton, Ashford Middlesex, Clerkenwell, Dulwich, Earls Court, Hammersmith, Harlesden, Kentish Town, Kingsbury, Lee Green, Leytonstone, North Finchley, Primrose Hill, South Clapham, South Harrow, Staines, Stanmore, Twickenham, Wembley, West Drayton, Winchmore Hill.

30TH DEC 2011
Balham, Bermondsey, Chiswick, Deptford, Feltham, Finchley, Hackney, Hatch End, Hayes, Hendon, Kenton Road, Northolt, Perivale, Stepney, Sydenham, Tulse Hill, Upton Park, Walthamstow, Wandsworth, Willesden.

Puts into perspective that the delays to my own exchange were nothing personal. Of the 40 exchanges Openreach were under the evidently deluded opinion they would have ready by March 2011 they managed, err, two, Catford and Northwood. Most of the other 38 were pushed back by 6 months or more, and they perhaps more realistically aim for 20 exchanges per 3 months, including the delayed ones, after March.

God how annoying!!

I've been waiting months and months for FTTC, living on a new housing estate <2km from the exchange in a small village I thought we'd be on in no time...

It looks like our cabinet is pretty much the only one in the village which hasn't been FTTC'ed!!! Grr! Is there any way to request BT do our cabinet?

It says in the above link that we are FTTC ready

How annoying.

The whole rollout is a shambels. Just enabling an exchange isn't enough. In my exchange mortlake as far as i can tell they enabled the exchange in March after installing loads of cabinets months before but only one is actually live with no date for the rest. Its a bit of a con to say some exchanges are live when the coverage is less than 10%.

Midlands missing quite a few exchanges

Yes, that is exactly reason why I hate BT. There isn't enough BT infinity enabled exchanges in West Midlands.

Not the case for South East.

May not answer the actual delays but an Openreach installer told me only the slowest areas will be done first.

The whole rollout is a shambles? Based on what?

Certainly *somewhere* has to be first, and somewhere has to be last. And inbetween, other exchanges and cabinets get rolled out. Plans are made, and (naturally) change.

Anyone whose exchange+cabinet is at the start of the list is happy, and those at the end of the list are unhappy. But the natural features of a rollout are exactly those, and don't make it a shambles.

Constantly changing dates *is* something of a shambles, but I think BT have responded by giving exchanges a more generous time allowance now - which is why everywhere appears to have gone back significantly. There are other aspects of their system that are a shambles too, and I'm suffering one of them.

But I know where your frustration lies - it is in the huge black hole of information that exists after an exchange has gone live. We (the public) don't really know what is happening to any cabinets after that first go-live date, and it is easy to feel that BT have given up and gone elsewhere.

So to add some details...

BT tend to take an exchange live once the first 10 cabinets have been put into service.

Looking at the data inadvertently supplied by Openreach last week, Mortlake has 13 cabinets live at present, out of around 60 - and it looks like all bar 2 or 3 cabinets are due to be included - and as far as I can tell, they're still marked in phase 5a.

It might feel like a con to you when you aren't in the first 13 cabinets. But imagine how those customers would feel if they found out their service was being delayed because of holdups with 1 or 2 other cabinets.

A rollout is just that - a gradual rolling out. The country has been having them for 250 years (canal, rail, road, electricity, telephone, radio, TV, gas, airports, mobile phone, cable, internet and now broadband in it's 4th guise), so you'd think we'd be used to the idea by now.

In reply to a post by WWWombat:

The whole rollout is a shambles? Based on what?

I'd suggest that 95% of exchanges scheduled for deployment in March 2011 in Greater London falling behind schedule and at least one of those being listed as enabled (3 months late, Mortlake was originally scheduled for December 2010, listed as enabled March 2011) when only 28% of the cabinets are actually enabled is a shambles.

Call me harsh.

What happens since is remedial action after the shambles, doesn't change that it's a shambles in this neck of the woods, evidently YMMV depending on where in the country you are.

Edited by Ignitionnet (Wed 11-May-11 19:43:57)

Nice, mature and reasoned critique.