Switching to FTTC, downtime expected?

I'm going to move from Bethere ADSL to BT Infinity FTTC, will there be a period where I do not have internet access or will the switch be seamless? If there will be downtime, how long should I expect it to take?

Thanks.

There is downtime when the OR engineer visits your premises to instal the OR modem, visits the FTTC CAB to link the data from your line to the DSLAM and tests it.

An hour os so?

Generally very little downtime - somewhere between a few minutes and an hour-or-so, unless there are specific problems with your install or your ISP stuffs up somehow.

I switched from an LLU ISP (Be) to FTTC with A&A. The whole thing took less than an hour and that includes the installer nailing the VDSL modem to the wall and fixing up the cable to my master socket. the connection via Be worked fine until the switch-over, the connection via A&A worked fine immediately after.

If you are planning to need your connection for essential stuff such as you use it for business purposes: be paranoid and assume it could be out for the whole of the install day, and have alternate connectivity ready for those essentials.

Edited by dspillett (Tue 19-Jun-12 14:31:54)

I had Merula/Be and changed to Merula/FTTC. OR Eng rang on the due morning and asked if he could go ahead and change things over in the cabinet - said it would take 20 mins and he would then come round. I said OK, ADSL2+ went off and 30 mins later he arrived. It took ~ 10 mins to change the MS over and connect up the modem. Meanwhile I changed the settings in my Draytek 2820Vn and all worked immediately. So total time offline < <1 hour. OR bloke, [ex military BTW], was excellent, checked all house phones worked, VDSL2 OK and my setup was OK. Also ran the speed tests.

Very pleased!

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

I'm going to move from Bethere ADSL to BT Infinity FTTC, will there be a period where I do not have internet access or will the switch be seamless? If there will be downtime, how long should I expect it to take?

If all goes well it should be no more than half an hour.

I was down for an hour but that was because the engineer got confused by my wiring and didn't believe me when I explained it to him. Typical of an engineer really (I've been guilty of the same). I told him that my master socket had been moved to the study where he was fitting the faceplate but he insisted on investigating the mess of wiring coming into the house and ended up being confused. Eventually he went back to the cabinet and came back muttering something about the port not being activated.

But yeah - shouldn't take very long really.

We were the first installation on the cabinet - the OR engineer told me because of that he had to run some additional tests. But all in all was still less than an hour.

We were done in less than an hour. We were also the first connection on our cab.