FTTC Rollout Still Falling Behind

BT have managed to date to deliver only 30 of the exchandes on the December 2012 rollout schedule. This in spit of being almost 2 months in and with December being a short month. IT still looks as if it will only deliver about 60 of those 193 exchanges well short of the target. They also appear to be enabling few cabinits at the go live date to reach even this low figure.

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

BT have managed to date to deliver only 30 of the exchandes on the December 2012 rollout schedule. This in spit of being almost 2 months in and with December being a short month. IT still looks as if it will only deliver about 60 of those 193 exchanges well short of the target. They also appear to be enabling few cabinits at the go live date to reach even this low figure.

Exchanges aren't the important number, it's cabinets that matter and how many of those have been put in service in the last seven weeks.

Here in Widnes the exchange went live the second week of September this year.
Having done some research very few cabs have gone live. On the website there have now appeared drop pins on most all installed FTTC cabs not live telling us about a delay. The usual points, Planning probs, power probs, blocked ducts. But these cabs are in place and have power. . We must have the most blocked ducts in the country. My cab has been in place now some 4 months, powered but again no fibre so i am told. Please can some one tell me the logic of the cost of installing cabs and not finishing the job.

If a duct is blocked then it can be a case of waiting for the window of time when they can dig up that area to clear blockage.

Putting cabinets in place and powered is done because the teams doing it were available to do it then, they will now be elsewhere.

Different teams work on different parts of the rollout, they work over quite a large area so while progress may slow in one part the teams are elsewhere moving forward.

Their is a large amount of exchanges being enabled in your area, as Widnes has only just gone live many cabinets come live after the exchange and first cabinet has gone live- it will take time but the job will be completed.

My cab has power and i watched them blow fibre in my village yet i still have a yellow marker saying about a delay and what could be the cause.
Cant be blocked duct as i watched them blow the fibre then pull cables to the cab. cant be power a s its making a noise. and the last excuse is placement of the cab.. The cab is there so that cant be the reason.

have you seen they blow the fibre all the way from the handover node? Only needs one segment to be blocked to cause a delay.

Or they are playing a game so that people have something to complain about.

Are any other cabinets on the exchange accepting orders? As it could be the exchange that is the problem- best thing to do is email Openreach and ask them, aside from that just have to wait- alot of people without a cabinet yet.

I have all the post codes that follow the fibre to the exchange.
Starting from my village all the cabs have this marker the rest on the way back to the exchange dont have markers
I watched them blow fibre in my village and they spend the day doing that.. then a watched them pull big cables from the side of the cabs
then a few days later the yellow pins came up.
Now if there was a block it would be at the start of my village a s we are the only cabs with said markers.
Also BT had to dig up a [censored] load of roads from the exchange to my village from October to September due to blocked ducts.
so am thinking the yellow pin is out of date by a month and is no longer relevant or there is something else wrong that is not listed

In reply to a post by MCM:

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

BT have managed to date to deliver only 30 of the exchandes on the December 2012 rollout schedule. This in spit of being almost 2 months in and with December being a short month. IT still looks as if it will only deliver about 60 of those 193 exchanges well short of the target. They also appear to be enabling few cabinits at the go live date to reach even this low figure.

Exchanges aren't the important number, it's cabinets that matter and how many of those have been put in service in the last seven weeks.

Well around here, next to no activity, lots of planned work not carried out (some already completed severa months ago)and now a generic BS(pushpin) notice on the Openreach where & when site

There are multiple cabinets providing fibre broadband services to your postcode. There may be an issue with the deployment of these cabinets so please contact us at [email protected] to check the situation for your specific address

Just who do they think the are trying to blag ? although the cabinet placeholder Planned date has as yet not been changed, but i think will be only a matter of time before it does ,

Edited by tommy45 (Mon 19-Nov-12 19:12:44)

A fault with the DSLAM or at the headend. The cabinets are pre-built and installed with all equipment already inside. If the cabinet fails commissioning then it may require vendor support and replacements. Have also heard of power not being installed correctly.

Edited by deleted (Mon 19-Nov-12 19:57:55)

THe most strange way I have ever come across, BT seem to put Cowboy builder to shame they way they half to a job and then abandon it. They are also more inventive with excuses than the Cowboy builders

Power not being installed correctly. Thats the daftest lame excuse yet. I expect BT told you that garbage, THe cabinets are pre commissioned before being shipped and are ruggedised and burnt in for 7 days so the chance of them failing on site is very very low.

The typical time to announce a handful of exchanges going live is about 2 weeks so I would expect them to announce a few more next week. Typically it is about 6 to 12. Don't count on many cabinets being active though.

Well currently of the 192 they have delivered 30. They will probably release another 6 to 12 this week and a further 6 to 12 in another 2 weeks and another 2 weeks another 6 to 12. Taking the oplimistic end of 12 that means of the 192 only about 66 will be enabled with the rest being pushed out another 3 months which leaves thenm a 162 short of the target.

They need your skills as a project manager to look after the spreadsheets obviously and not a boss who is claiming there even further ahead of press targets

How exchanges and cabinets are now enabled?

Don't you read the news articles you don't like?

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/5530-bt-presses-d...

18months ahead of target so I'd say that counters your "behind" nonsense

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

THe cabinets are pre commissioned before being shipped and are ruggedised and burnt in for 7 days

Can we have a link to an authoritive document for that please?

I still think the yellow markers are out of date and wrong.
all blocks have been removed via large road works by BT

Of course power isnt just about running a cable to the nearest lamp post and plugging it in. Each cabinet has to be electrically certified . If it fails certification then it cant be comissioned until the issues have been rectified .
As an aside, if the telemetary line isnt working the the meter cannot be installed and tested.
Hardware fails on 1st installation does happen. To try and suggest its almost impossible is just ludicrous
Going back to the post i originally replied to, if the cabinet is powered and can be heard then it must have passed certification, so either the fibre is incomplete/fault, or the headend is not ready/fault , or there is fault with the cabinet in some respect.

Edited by deleted (Tue 20-Nov-12 08:58:26)

no updates on twitter since 5 nov?

Where do you get the idea from that they connect the power to a lampost?

The power is self certified so I am not clear where you get the idea that certification delays things. It is in any case a very simple task

It was a sarcastic remark to an ill informed post by yourself.
Just getting the supply to the cabinet is only part of the power installation.

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

Where do you get the idea from that they connect the power to a lampost?

The power is self certified so I am not clear where you get the idea that certification delays things. It is in any case a very simple task

What a total load of rubbish ...

They can and do connect power to the base of lamp-posts if appropriate.

Certification of power is NOT a simple task - but as you are not qualified to do it, you would not know. Some can be self certified and some may not. BT takes the safety of staff and customers very seriously.

In reply to a post by Ribble:

It was a sarcastic remark to an ill informed post by yourself.
Just getting the supply to the cabinet is only part of the power installation.

I would suggest it was not actually sarcastic. Lamp-posts often have a power interconnect facility in the base which can be used for other services such as street signs and BT do (with permission) connect in if appropriate as the location of the cable is known, rather than a massive dig and having to break into a live cable.

Like I don't follow that feed

Interested in how bob is tracking the 1000's of cabinets across the UK

Just out of interest (I know nothing about these things and don't pretend to) - As the lamp post power is presumably paid for by the local authority - if BT connect to it, how do they get metered and charged for the power they use - any idea???

Street lights are not, in general, metered. Each local authority agrees with the power company the number of lights, street signs, bollards &c and the hours that each one will be on. Some are controlled by sensor and others by old control wires. Based on the number of hours usage and power consumption which will drop as new street lights become more efficient, a monthly fee is charged. So, if it is gloomier than predicted the power company looses, but if there is plenty of early sun in January they win ...

BT phone boxes were run on a similar basis and Bus Stop Shelters are too.

I believe that an FTTC cabinet has an internal meter which reports back across a telemetry link and actual consumption is paid for.

In reply to a post by Garyilka:

Just out of interest (I know nothing about these things and don't pretend to) - As the lamp post power is presumably paid for by the local authority - if BT connect to it, how do they get metered and charged for the power they use - any idea???

There's a smart meter in each cabinet.

Power may connected to the same supply as a lampost but will be metered independantly. There is a smart meter inside each cabinet with a dedicated telemetary line to access the meter readings.
These are part of the power installation.

Ta...

It is not sensible to connect to a lamppost to obtain a power supply and the feed onm it is not intended for that purpose. Lamp posts can and do get knocked down and lamp post will get replaced.

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

It is not sensible to connect to a lamppost to obtain a power supply and the feed onm it is not intended for that purpose. Lamp posts can and do get knocked down and lamp post will get replaced.

If the feed were problematic UK Power Networks, etc, wouldn't allow it to happen or would, and do, require BT pay for upgrade to the supply to make it viable.

I presume now having spoken authoritatively on BDUK and several other things you're now trying to tell UK Power Networks et al how to run their grids?

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

It is not sensible to connect to a lamppost to obtain a power supply and the feed onm it is not intended for that purpose. Lamp posts can and do get knocked down and lamp post will get replaced.

Yet more verbal diarrhoea!

You really are making a name for yourself Bob you remind me of another person who used to haunt this site/forum

Bob

Funny from the Beginning of Oct to 5th November 41 new exchanges were available. Today another 7 have been made available, that's 48 not 30 this quarter.

I was in the middle of doing some research last week on old files I had kept, as last time this came up someone wanted to know how many of the historiccaly announced Exchages had actually been enabled.

I have tracked back through some files to a copy taken on 01/03/2012 and the following is the result.

At 01/03/2012 there were 421 Exchanges in the 'coming soon' list and 782 Accepting orders

Of the 'coming soon' list 390 are now accepting orders, with 31 not yet active, 7.4% of the total. Some of these have slipped 6 months.

Of these 5 are no longer in the 11/11/2012 'coming soon' list at all! So need your sympathy (EARLS COURT, HOO, LANCING, SHOREHAM, STORRINGTON).

In addition 73 Exchanges are accepting orders that were not in the coming soon list at 01/03/12 making 463 activated since 01/03/2012.

In total at 11/11/2012 1245 exchanges were accepting orders
.
There are now 199 exchanges in the coming soon list, 120 for Dec 2012 and 79 for Mar 2013.

Move 7 from coming soon to available for those announced today 20/11/12

BT cabinets get crashed into too, and manholes can collapse when tanks park on the them too

In addition

From the 14/11/2011 one year ago to 11/11/2012 only 10 exchanges on the coming soon list have not been made available, CRAYFORD, EARLS COURT, ERITH, FLITWICK, NAILSWORTH, PADDINGTON, SANDWICH, TADLEY, WEST KENSINGTON & WINKFIELD ROW.

This is out of 313 that were on the list a year ago. So only 10 have slipped from 1 year ago and at least 2 of these have been due to one London Council not BT.

In addition there have been 334 made available that were not on the coming soon list a year ago. So these have ALL been achieved within the year of being announced so cannot have slipped more than 5 months at max and may only be 2 ( announced for June or Sep 2012).

I also have files for 12/12/2011 so may look again next month if I can find time!

In reply to a post by kitcat:

In addition

From the 14/11/2011 one year ago to 11/11/2012 only 10 exchanges on the coming soon list have not been made available, CRAYFORD, EARLS COURT, ERITH, FLITWICK, NAILSWORTH, PADDINGTON, SANDWICH, TADLEY, WEST KENSINGTON & WINKFIELD ROW.

This is out of 313 that were on the list a year ago. So only 10 have slipped from 1 year ago and at least 2 of these have been due to one London Council not BT.

In addition there have been 334 made available that were not on the coming soon list a year ago. So these have ALL been achieved within the year of being announced so cannot have slipped more than 5 months at max and may only be 2 ( announced for June or Sep 2012).

I also have files for 12/12/2011 so may look again next month if I can find time!

Although BT is announcing exchanges even if they announced as excepting orders well in advance of the place holder dates (although this is can frequently be the 2dn or 3rd time) such place a holder date is announced by BT , AKA FTTC Rollout

But due to the fact that some of these announced as excepting orders exchanges, will typically only have a small percent of FFTC cabs actually RFS and these do have a tendency to be within areas served by VM cable, So in real terms not much use to BT or potential customers
So with so many FFTC cabinets not yet RFS then the real job is no where near complete, the info that BT publicly announce could be in the eyes of some misleading

It would be nice if accurate upto date info regarding the Status of every FFTC cab on every exchange announced within the previous 3mths so thats Sept 30th 12
I would bet that the percentage of FFTC cabinets RFS and accepting orders Within this 3mth window,would paint a very different picture, one that BT would not be proud of.

Maybe some independent group will one day start gathering info such as this and putting it in the public domain,

Edited by tommy45 (Tue 20-Nov-12 14:58:34)

As expected BT hs release a few more exchanges on the low side of my estimate of 6 to 12. They have realeased today 7 exchanges

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

As expected BT hs release a few more exchanges on the low side of my estimate of 6 to 12. They have realeased today 7 exchanges

And what has that got to do with using a power feed from a lamp-post?

CITC maybe?

I though bob was collating that information as he talks with authority on cab delays.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

I though bob was collating that information as he talks with authority on cab delays.

Doesn't Bob talk with authority on everything? We are very fortunate having someone so knowledgeable here with us.

Come think of it, the info on FFTC cabs being RFS or not,
Will be made available to ISP's who sell FTTX products
So they could save people a lot of time, as they will presumably have the info in a data base ,which should be up-to date
Maybe one or two of them will help out with the collation of the info, they maybe even would do it for free,?
so that we could then see a true picture of just how well things are going or not going as the case maybe

Edited by tommy45 (Tue 20-Nov-12 16:49:43)

No doubt that info is Restricted/In confidence and not for public viewing

Not sure why Winkfield row is on the coming soon list as its down as a FE 2013 exchange on the where and when map.
Tadley should be going live soon as work looks to have finished in the town.

In reply to a post by GMAN98:

No doubt that info is Restricted/In confidence and not for public viewing

No doubt that it is, but if such info was uploaded somewhere anonymously they couldn't point the finger at any specific ISP , or stop supplying the info to isp's without a financial cost to themselves .
But it doesn't stop those us who are the insignificants / general public in BT's eyes from collating the info at a local level to us, once FTTC cabs are in it's fairly easily to find out which are RFS

The info though is in the Public Domain so I cannot see how BT can claim it is confidential other than those they have not formally released

In reply to a post by Bob_s2:

The info though is in the Public Domain so I cannot see how BT can claim it is confidential other than those they have not formally released

where ? i can't find anything apart from the blurb from BT generic info which is not cab specific as to which cabs are RFS & accepting orders

As said the ISP's will have this info supplied to them by BT but this wouldn't necessarily be public info , if it was then isp's would provide a list of cab numbers with current status & rfs for each enabled exchange

In reply to a post by tommy45:

In reply to a post by GMAN98:

No doubt that info is Restricted/In confidence and not for public viewing

No doubt that it is, but if such info was uploaded somewhere anonymously they couldn't point the finger at any specific ISP

They seem to have identified the leaker(s) of the two we have had.

It only needs one invalid entry per ISP and a query on a forum such as this that hits that line.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

In reply to a post by tommy45:

In reply to a post by GMAN98:

No doubt that info is Restricted/In confidence and not for public viewing

No doubt that it is, but if such info was uploaded somewhere anonymously they couldn't point the finger at any specific ISP

They seem to have identified the leaker(s) of the two we have had.

It only needs one invalid entry per ISP and a query on a forum such as this that hits that line.

Nothing to stop several isp's comparing such data they have to find these delibrate errors before making some or all of that info available, minus the error/s designed to identify who leaked the info, Or do they BT expect members of the public to request the info via a freedom of information request, There IMO is no real justified reasoning behind their secrecy apart from to hide their ineptness perhaps

In reply to a post by tommy45:

, Or do they BT expect members of the public to request the info via a freedom of information request, There IMO is no real justified reasoning behind their secrecy apart from to hide their ineptness perhaps

BT are not subject to FOI requests.

There information is commercially sensitive and why does anyone have a right to it? Does your comapny publish their business plans?

All

If you wish to look at post code data this is now available on the Ofcom site for all postcodes. Postcode data this is at 30th June 2012.

The only problem is the list is more than 1m lines long so I can't load it all into excel. I will have to load into access and remove all the invalid codes as they have used every possible code!

This is the detailed info you have all been looking for and says up to 65% of premises can now get SFBB. (This is a combination of both Virgin and BT ).

Read the whole report for all the detail. The link is also on the news article on the main page.

The information is not for the public its commercial, is that hard to understand?

Commercial information passing from one company to another.

In reply to a post by tommy45:

Nothing to stop several isp's comparing such data they have to find these delibrate errors before making some or all of that info available, minus the error/s designed to identify who leaked the info

Except reality.

The information is available fromthe BT web site and the leaked spreadsheet.Not a 100^ accurate but gives most of the information

I don't think that is really the info people want. It shows actual speed test data, presumably from the samknows testing system, not cabinet data and planned phases for the postcodes. It does say whether or not FTTx is available, but people already know that.

Go on pick a postcode and show us.

Cabinets that see delays are having pins show up, but this is a long way from the cab level that people are asking for.

I have the list - not much gets past me, just don't always have time to do stuff with it.

A fair few postcodes have no data at all, need a few hours to take a better look and figure out if or if not useful.

Tommy was asking for Data on Cabinets that are RFS,

I don't believe the RFS Cabinet data is supplied to ISPs as that wouldn't help as they wouldn't know which number is on which Cab.

What would be available is access to a database of Postcodes via the postcode checker, same as the data quoted.

Also access to a Number checker that says exactly which line is available same as the Customer visible Wholesale and Infinity checkers. This would also have 'nearly live' line test data to give expected speeds.

For live areas served by BT not LLU I think we see the same data on the public checkers as the ISP use, although they may have slightly more technical info. Only for Sky and TalkTalk unbundled lines they, (Sky and Talktalk), have not made the number info publicly available as they don't want their customers 'poached'.

BT get slated on here for not making info public, but they are completely open once they know that the cab can be served. (BTWholesale and BTRetail that is)

Andrew

There are 1.7m Postcodes in the list, but only 1.2 have OK data in. Some do not exist in reality( No Premises) some have too little data 1/2 houses only.

It does show where 'NGA' is available and not available but there is no premises count to work out coverage etc.

Too late at night for me now and too big to do anything easily even in Access.

In reply to a post by kitcat:

I don't believe the RFS Cabinet data is supplied to ISPs as that wouldn't help as they wouldn't know which number is on which Cab.

ISPs have access to the updated versions of the leaked spreadsheets. Fact.

I have a feeling that line/cabinet info is also available to them, but wouldn't swear to it.

Now every single post code in my area has a yellow pin with the same generic info on the delay.
We need more information from the yellow pin of disappointment.

In reply to a post by kitcat:

Tommy was asking for Data on Cabinets that are RFS,

I don't believe the RFS Cabinet data is supplied to ISPs as that wouldn't help as they wouldn't know which number is on which Cab.

What would be available is access to a database of Postcodes via the postcode checker, same as the data quoted.

Also access to a Number checker that says exactly which line is available same as the Customer visible Wholesale and Infinity checkers. This would also have 'nearly live' line test data to give expected speeds.

For live areas served by BT not LLU I think we see the same data on the public checkers as the ISP use, although they may have slightly more technical info. Only for Sky and TalkTalk unbundled lines they, (Sky and Talktalk), have not made the number info publicly available as they don't want their customers 'poached'.

BT get slated on here for not making info public, but they are completely open once they know that the cab can be served. (BTWholesale and BTRetail that is)

ISP's or at least some know which cabs are accepting orders = (RFS) But what info they have access to i ain't sure, could be some type of data base from BT wholesale,or they have some way of using the existing adsl checker info to extract this info on each post code area served by each exchange , = so isp can just search the exchange name,and all FTTC cabs that are accepting orders are listed that i am 99.9% sure exists although it may not be always up to date

Why are you both rabbiting on about whether or not ISPs have the updated versions of the leaked spreadsheets? And whether or not they have access to the RFS data?

The answer to both is yes they do.

What differs between ISPs is who on their staff gets to know about it. It seems to be that the bigger the ISP the less their "customer-facing" staff know. No surprise there!

How they use that data also seems to vary. BT Retail apparently being quite laggardly sometimes in updating its internal lookups. It is quite common for people here to be able to sign up to FTTC with a smaller ISP when "Infinity" is still not available to them - and not because of a low speed estimate.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

Why are you both rabbiting on about whether or not ISPs have the updated versions of the leaked spreadsheets? And whether or not they have access to the RFS data?

The answer to both is yes they do.

What differs between ISPs is who on their staff gets to know about it. It seems to be that the bigger the ISP the less their "customer-facing" staff know. No surprise there!

How they use that data also seems to vary. BT Retail apparently being quite laggardly sometimes in updating its internal lookups. It is quite common for people here to be able to sign up to FTTC with a smaller ISP when "Infinity" is still not available to them - and not because of a low speed estimate.

Well after spending around 1hr doing some research inputting multiple adress and post code info into the bt checker, i notice that openreach have announced a nearby smaller exchange is accepting orders, and there is at least 1 FTTC cab RFS the exchange wasn't planned until dec12 that may make them look good, but this is at a cost of further delays to others my exchange after being brought fowards only to be pushed back again ,

was accepting orders back in sept if not a little before, i have established so far that a further 1 FFTC cab, totalling 3 out of around 20 FFTC installed cabs are now accepting orders,

but once again they are cherry picking VM media cabled areas,
They must be really stupid if they belive that they will get a substantial take up in those areas, They have no chance, this sort of thing really boils my urine

Edited by tommy45 (Wed 21-Nov-12 01:27:37)

Here you go again quoting a complete post when it's unnecessary. In this case not even relevant to what you have posted in reply to it. It is an extremely tiresome and space-wasting thing to do, and makes it far harder to see what you are actually replying to. Therefore it is counter-productive.

YOU CAN EDIT WITHIN A QUOTE BEFORE POSTING!!!!!! Or just copy & paste the relevant part of a post within quote marks. Everyone can see what post you are replying to from the post headers anyway so the link produced by using the Quote button is merely a convenience - so that people can quickly get to the full post replied to if they wish to read it all - a function negated by your slipshot and lazy way of using it.

Pleasssssee pretty please, be more considerate, and help yourself get your arguments across more clearly at the same time. See how much easier it is to follow what people who use quotations sensibly are talking about.

In reply to a post by tommy45:

Nothing to stop several isp's comparing such data they have to find these delibrate errors before making some or all of that info available, minus the error/s designed to identify who leaked the info, Or do they BT expect members of the public to request the info via a freedom of information request, There IMO is no real justified reasoning behind their secrecy apart from to hide their ineptness perhaps

So in order to get timely and accurate information you want the data to be edited by other companies before being released? Yeah that should do wonders to speed up the process and ensure accuracy :-/

Freedom of Information requests are between citizens and the government. They allow us as citizens to find out what the government has been doing. BT is not owned by the government so FoI is irrelevant. Only Ofcom has the power to make BT publish internal planning and progress reports. Frankly people like you are part of why so many companies choose to say nothing. They still get criticised but at least they avoid the hassle of publishing information.

Edited by Andrue (Wed 21-Nov-12 10:09:14)

In reply to a post by GMAN98:

You really are making a name for yourself Bob you remind me of another person who used to haunt this site/forum

Didn't he get badly burnt after being called onto the carpet?

LOL. I've often wondered what happened to him.

THey do not even always use the yellow pin that seems to be fairly ad hoc and sometimers they use it intially when an exchange goes live and dropit after a few weeks

Sometime th Royal mail preallocated Postcodes on the basis of expected developments

That's the fella

I think he lives on ISPReview now as Deduction/truth4free

In reply to a post by GMAN98:

I think he lives on ISPReview now as Deduction/truth4free

I thought I recognised the style of writing.