Changing from BT Infinity - will service improve

Hi everyone,

I'm new to the forum, and I have a question about how fibre broadband services work.

I know that compared to some parts of the country, where we live (north London) has very good fibre broadband provision. We currently have BT Infinity Broadband (FTTC), and the speeds are fine when it works, but it frequently simply stops working. We have had frequent visits from BT engineers, after which the broadband has worked for a few days and then disappeared again. There are also recurring problems with the landline.

I'd like to understand what would actually change if we changed fibre broadband provider. To what extent do other providers rely on BT equipment at the exchange, or on BT fibre to the cabinet in the street, or on BT copper wire from the cabinet to my home?

Thanks for your help,

David

Recurring problems with the landline and broadband disappears ... sounds as though te problem is somewhere between you and the cabinet or possibly you and the exchange.

If you change provider, those links will not change so nothing will improve.

Have you reported it to BT as a voice fault? and have they responded?

We have reported our recurring proroblems to BT frequently and often, engineers have visited and inspected and repaired and declared everything to be fine, which it clearly isn't.

I resent paying money to BT for poor phone and broadband service (and atrocious so-called "customer service")

Thanks

David

The question is, what have you been reporting?

Your best chance of a resolution is if you can prove a voice fault, and report that. Without mentioning broadband at all.

Have you ever done the Quiet line test using preferably a corded phone into the test socket, (on the wall at the back in this pic)? It's 17070 Option 2.

If you have any noise, that's what you report. As I said, do not mention any broadband troubles. If there is a phone fault, correcting it nearly always sorts out the broadband anyway.

Edit - to get to the test socket when you have FTTC/Infinity you need to remove both faceplates - see this page.

Edited by RobertoS (Tue 08-Apr-14 22:26:25)

Hi Roberto,

Thanks for the instructions, I will try the "quiet test" as you suggest. I certainly didn't realise that there was a second "test socket" hidden behind the first "test socket"!

Thanks

David

RobertoS gave you good advice, just a little technical insight into what this test achieves (if you didn't already know).
In a conventional BT installation all extension sockets are wired into the rear of the front removable faceplate.
By removing all faceplates, and plugging into the hidden telephone socket, this "should" take the internal telephone wiring out of the loop and prove that the fault doesn't exist on your internal cabling (which in most cases isn't BT's problem and can invoke a call out charge.)
Obviously we don't live in an ideal world and the above scenario can be totally wrong depending on how messed up your phone wiring is.

In reply to a post by flipdee:

Obviously we don't live in an ideal world and the above scenario can be totally wrong depending on how messed up your phone wiring is.

And it's probably worth pointing out that a lot of problems can be traced back to internal wiring issues although presumably fewer with FTTC due to engineer install requirement. Still it'a always worth bearing in mind that the more you slag off another person the more likely it is that the fault will turn out to be yours

Was I slagging someone else off?