Fibre came and went!

Hi there,

I wonder if anyone can help.

Exchange Cabinet 4 Castle Combe went live for FTTC two weeks ago. Showing available to order so orders placed for new lines and Fibre products.

ISP (Zen) now advise 'no spare DSLAM ports in the cabinet'. BT checker site and Zen site now showing that FTTC not available in the area and status changed to 'Exploring other solutions' - a big change from accepting orders.

Is this something that is normal - temporary blips in capacity or will a new cabinet need to be installed? Unfortunately several new line installations and business relocation are dependent on this, so if it is game over for FTTC, then another location will be needed.

Many, many thanks in advance to anyone that can help.

Two likely explanations

1. Line cards failed shortly after first customers went live
or
2. Enough people ordered that the initial capacity has gone, and just needs someone with more line cards in the boot of their car to install one

The need for another cabinet will usually be some way away, as space for a couple of line card upgrades normally.

Thank you MrSaffron for you very swift reply - much appreciated.

Following your logic then, keeping the orders live should / might perhaps / with a following wind, give someone with a line card in their boot a reason to stop by the cabinet. i.e. there is a definite need therefore pop one in. Do you concur?

I am just very surprised, by the changes to all the vendor checks, including the BT DSL Checker site - no longer available at all - just ADSL Max - yesterday it had FTTC - gone. Do these change from available to order to Not available at all so quickly? I would have expected them to say available but delay due to capacity.

Once again many, many thanks in advance.

The checkers sometimes throw a wobbly so might even just be computer says no issue, first stage is for the providers to check their data and raise it with their wholesaler i.e. Openreach usually

If a real capacity issue then its just a case of the teams doing those upgrades working their way around the cabinets that need new hardware adding

Thank you MrSaffron, your insight is very much appreciated.

Logically then I will keep the orders in, and hopefully all will turn out good.

I will revert back with the final outcome - as to when, hopefully soon.

Once again, many, many thanks.

1st line card in the cabinet has reached capacity. Needs the right people to spot it and request additional capacity to be provided

Thank you Ribble, that is good to know.

Do you have any experience / knowledge of how long this process typically takes? Having orders already 'in motion', would that be enough to trigger 'the right people''?

Many thanks in advance for your time taken assisting me.

Can't say. Seems a bit of a lottery to me

Same at my cab. Gone from acceptig orders to Exploring Solutions.

Sorry to hear you are in the same boat as me bobble_bob.

Perhaps the worse bit is being unable to obtain any information from Openreach regarding a reason and resolution. Openreach is a huge organisation with huge logistics and manpower and of course different priorities and curved balls no doubt every day facing them - this is not an Openreach bash. But it would be helpful at the least to the end business user if they could simply let ISPs know a) the reason and b) a possible resolution date. This would allow the end user the ability to make informed decisions to uae alternative technologies in the interim.

Sure they probably do not want to make promises they cannot keep, as I would not wish to do so with my business, but more information than 'you cannot have it' has to be a positive for all. If they can update their website in a matter of hours to say this, perhaps it also might be possible to state why and when in the future......or is it really a fire fighting lottery as perhaps suggested earlier in this thread?

Do ISPs have more info as to a possible fix date? Guess they might know more or can lean on Openreach to get some info from them. Just guessing mind

Do ISPs have more info as to a possible fix date? Guess they might know more or can lean on Openreach to get some info from them

Doubt it. May find that it's more than a line card required. Often only limited tie pairs are provided and may need additional duct

Is increasing capacity something that eventually will be done, or can Openreach just say capacity is full on the card and its tough luck and never add another card?

Hi Bobble_bob,

You would have hoped that ISPs could obtain some more information. I tried that and my ISP (Zen) were very helpful in trying. They contacted Openreach and we're told no other information available other than 'no available ports on the DSLAM', that's it - no information as to whether this was due to a fault, reached capacity, an error or something else. Thus my original post on this thread.

When placing the order there was Fibre, a week later not. I don't expect Openreach to be able to micro-manage my orders, but it would be useful to know whether the hold-up is a short term or long term problem, then I can work-around will due process and resources work through. Surely it cannot be that difficult to tell the ISP what time frame is expected e.g. one week, one month, one year?

Bobble_bob,

Is increasing capacity something that eventually will be done, or can Openreach just say capacity is full on the card and its tough luck and never add another card?

This is the million dollar question and I suspect there is no answer obtainable from Openreach. There have been several very helpful people responding on this thread, but from what I can deduce, it could be a fault, computer error, line card full, run out of ties, new duct required, cabinet full and it goes on. The problem is each will have a different resolution period and without a rough idea the end user is left in the dark.

I have to run a business and was really hoping someone could tell me. In the absence of information I will have to utilise other technologies, probably sattelite.

It just seems strange, the way Openreach communicate or rather don't. If I ran my business, ran out of stock and told companies that's it for now, no further information, I wouldn't expect to hear from them again. As previously said I understand that Openreach is a huge machine, and as such cannot communicate to Bloggs and Jones, but surely the ISPs could be told as they are losing revenue in this process.....

In reply to a post by bobble_bob:

Is increasing capacity something that eventually will be done, or can Openreach just say capacity is full on the card and its tough luck and never add another card?

If a cabinet just needs an extra card then yes, Openreach will install more - it makes commercial sense to do so. Compared to installing a Cabinet, a new line card is a minor issue (though you can understand why they don't want to fit too many when commissioning the Cabinet)

The wholesale checker used to (may still) state the date more capacity was due to be added once this information was available.

Openreach have also recently introduced a system where ISP's can 'queue' orders waiting for spare capacity to become available - which keeps the order alive in their systems but its unclear if any/many ISPs are yet using it

Of course, the OP now knows they shouldn't have waited a week to order - guess there was a lot of pent up demand in the area for FTTC

Edited by gt94sss2 (Sat 31-Oct-15 13:17:46)

Wholesale checker on my line doesnt even show any FTTC info. Used to give estimated speeds like it does for ADSL. Even that has been removed now

Mendip - what does the wholesale checker say for your line? Does it still list estimated speeds for fibre?

Edited by bobble_bob (Sat 31-Oct-15 13:02:04)

I reckon the cab is half full, so extra capacity is available, just at matter of when

Hi gt94sss2,

Many thanks for your helpful response, espcially the wait list point. I will take this up with my account manager on Monday. In relation to:

Of course, you now know you shouldn't have waited a week - guess there was a lot of pent up demand in your area for FTTC

With hindsight I see what you are saying, but not much choice as this was a premises move for a business subdivision. Just to be clear, when the orders for Fibre were placed they were accepted by ISP, a week later Openreach have come back saying 'No spare ports at the DSLAM'. I didn't have any real chance of ordering it earlier, as I hadn't taken ownership of the location. I am still surprised that an order can be accepted by the ISP and Openreach and then a week later rejected. It would be really helpful if Openreach could tell the ISP roughly how long a resolution would be.....

Edited by deleted (Sat 31-Oct-15 13:53:30)

Hi Bobble_bob,

Mendip - what does the wholesale checker say for your line? Does it still list estimated speeds for fibre?

Pretty much the same:

ADSL Max: 0.5
Fixed Line 0.25

No FTTC speeds anymore........also the BT website for Superfast has gone from Accepting Orders to Expoloring Solutions overnight a week after placing orders.....

Hi Ribble,

Thank you for your post / advice:

just at matter of when

My point entirely -it would be so helpful to know, so that I can plan a route forwards for that business unit.

Just confirmation of the problem and a realistic date from Openreach / ISP and I can work-around with other solutions. Cost is not a big issue, connectivity and reliability is,.....

In reply to a post by Mendip:

Just to be clear, when the orders for Fibre were placed they were accepted by ISP, a week later Openreach have come back saying 'No spare ports at the DSLAM'. I didn't have any real chance of ordering it earlier, as I hadn't taken ownership of the location. I am still surprised that an order can be accepted by the ISP and Openreach and then a week later rejected. It would be really helpful if Openreach could tell the ISP roughly how long a resolution would be.....

Yes, I was being flippant - hence the smiley

I am also surprised your ISP were able to accept an order and then have it rejected a week later - most ISPs will have an automated ordering system which I imagine would place the order with Openreach within seconds if done online - and at that point Openreach should reserve a port at the Cabinet for you/update capacity for future orders.. so is it possible your ISP delayed placing your order?

Generally speaking, if you place an order against a line (even for something like call waiting),the wholesale checker updates within hours to say there is an open order against that telephone number.

If there was no capacity and the ISP are not using the new waiting system, I would have expected them to be unable to place an order.

As I say, Openreach tend to update the wholesale checker with the date they plan to fit more line cards once scheduled - someone who works for Openreach may be able to comment on average timescales but its a simple job - it usually just depends on them allocating the task + spare linecards to an engineer/contractor to do

If a newly commissioned Cabinet its very unlikely to be another issue unless they have found a fault with the equipment already installed and that should have been picked up during pre-commissioning testing..

Mendip

OR would normally fit 1 card with 96 ports and a 100 pair cable ( actually 2 one in each direction) between the cabinets.

As all 96 ports were ordered in two weeks they will have to fit another card with 96 ports but will also have to fit another 100 pair cable. The card should be easy just a simpler slide in but the extra cable may take longer, they need to open up both cabinets and pull in the new cable and terminate it so could be a little while. ( Getting new cabs in will be a priority to hit the BDUK targets first, otherwise other areas will complian they are not covered at all, but they will come back to it when they an fit it in the programme. )

As the cabinet is a major cost OR will always find it economic to provide the cards up to the cabinet capacity, but it can take time to run the cables and there is a slight risk if the copper cabinet does not have enough space to terminate the additional cables in.

From Ribble's half full we can deduce that this is a small FTTC cab with only 192 capacity. Once that is full it will be a much longer wait for a second cab!. ( If economic!!)

I would have expected your area to have had poor Broadband before FTTC arrived that has driven the large demend at the point FTTC was provided, hopefully you haven't got many more than 200 premises served from it or some people are going to be disappointed.

It just seems strange, the way Openreach communicate or rather don't. If I ran my business, ran out of stock and told companies that's it for now, no further information, I wouldn't expect to hear from them again. As previously said I understand that Openreach is a huge machine, and as such cannot communicate to Bloggs and Jones, but surely the ISPs could be told as they are losing revenue in this process.....

Having had, in the past, the same lack of info on their plans for an area from Openreach, I think you have summed up quite eloquently why a fair number of people think Openreach needs to be hived off from BT. Maybe write a letter to your MP. It won't help your current situation but it does give some comfort knowing you are helping to drive another nail in by bringing such lack of business acumen to the attention of the powers that be i.e. how poor Openreach communications really are. When I wrote, I didn't just get a reply from my MP but found my letter had been pushed upstairs. Who knows, you might even wake up the likes of Cameron etc.

As for the plans for your area, sadly you will stay in the dark. Sometimes though, it does pay to go visit roadworks.org. Such things like 'BT duct work' will bring far more light on things than you'll ever get from OR. Unfortunately the onus is on you to keep on checking, rather than on OR to give out what should be freely available information. It is after all, from the sounds of it, a capacity issue. And as you quite rightly say, it affects directly the business of not only the ISP's but yours as well.

Post deleted by Nightglow

Edited by Nightglow (Sun 01-Nov-15 10:11:13)

Just looked on roadwork.org and noticed that BT are doing some work just up the road from my cab

Description is "Locate and excavate 2 subsequent blockage in existing duct"

In reply to a post by Mendip:

It just seems strange, the way Openreach communicate or rather don't. If I ran my business, ran out of stock and told companies that's it for now, no further information, I wouldn't expect to hear from them again. As previously said I understand that Openreach is a huge machine, and as such cannot communicate to Bloggs and Jones, but surely the ISPs could be told as they are losing revenue in this process.....

Its quite possible that the ISPs are are more understanding - after all they are interested in more customers overall and know that any delays in installing new capacity at existing locations is likely to be more than compensated for by new cabinets being fitted elsewhere.

Also, timing is not always in the gift of Openreach- it can depend on 3rd party suppliers, electricity companies, council planning permission etc. for which they may not have accurate timing for

You may know that Openreach used to publicly give much more accurate timescales of when work would be done/cabinets go live - a small minority complained that this wasn't accurate enough and the ASA effectively made them issue much vaguer timescales as a result... - which were much less use to everyone.

Good to hear you have some info. You'll get far more (reliable) info and dare I say 'comfort' going on that website (I certainly did). At least you now know why and a time scale for a possible resolution and more importantly, that things are in hand. There really is nothing worse than being left wandering around aimlessly in the dark. The info there could just as easily be put out on the OR site at the same time. Why it isn't is beyond me.

Openreach will continue adding cards and then additional cabinets.

I doubt the work is related to the (what i assume) capacity issue at my cab. Not sure what kind of work is going on but seems there is some blockage of some sort that BT are fixing, not adding capacity to my cab. Location of it isnt quite right either

Just checked again and FTTC has been updated

FTTC Range A (Clean) 79.2 59.7 20 18.8 -- Waiting list
FTTC Range B (Impacted) 71.4 46.2 20 13.9 -- Waiting list

Anyone care to shed light on what waiting list means?

It's covered earlier in the thread.

In reply to a post by bobble_bob:

I doubt the work is related to the (what i assume) capacity issue at my cab. Not sure what kind of work is going on but seems there is some blockage of some sort that BT are fixing, not adding capacity to my cab. Location of it isnt quite right either

Correct, there's already spare fibres in the tube feeding your cabinet. I've lost track of what size backhaul is to a cabinet initially. Bu anyway they can usually increase it without needing to use extra physical fibres. It's more about what's at either end of the fibre. So duct blockages won't affect you at this stage.

Today the checker has removed FTTC stats on my line. I dont think they know whats going on

1 Gigabit and usually four fibres

Just for information, I was in a similar situation a couple of weeks ago. My cabinet was not accepting orders due to 'high demand' for at least the last year. Then it started taking orders and I booked infinity straight away which was due to be installed on Friday last week.

I have just opened another thread on what happened next but in short the wholesale site started reporting 'waiting list' before my go live date, then I got switched to BT on Friday and they could not find a spare port on the DSLAM. They ended up connecting me to a crossed line back to the exchange with NO internet at all and no incoming calls. I am still waiting for it to be fixed.

So, getting the order placed is no guarantee that you will get a port come the installation day.

Oh, and no communication from BT over the whole thing apart from an email to say the line has been transferred and infinity will follow. The only way I found out the above was by pestering the helpdesk until I got through to someone with a clue who looked up what was going on.

And tonight fibre is now available again

Not sure i believe it going on how it changes whenever i check it and according to the roadworks website no work was planned at the cab this weekend just gone

Edited by bobble_bob (Mon 02-Nov-15 22:58:05)

And tonight fibre is now available again

Great to hear bobble_bob. No luck this end.

As the OP of this thread I would like to thank everyone who has posted comments and advice thus far - a great community with lots of perspective, experience and points of view - very much appreciated.

As for me, well nothing has changed yet. I will give the situation until Friday and then I have to sanction a different technology, as I cannot expect much from my employees on 256kb/s. Thinking of Satellite for the meantime (22Mb/s Down / 6 Mb/s Up). Cost around £100 / month with fixed IP. That should suffice for the meantime, and then if and when OR do address the capacity issues, may eventually obtain Fibre. May even keep satellite as redundancy path.

My ISP tried to wait-list my orders, rejected by OR. The ISP was fully aware of the process and OR would give no reason even after they telephoned them - I can understand they do not wish to talk to the end-consumer / business, but why do they stone-wall their own effective re-sellers?

The losers in this process will be my ISP, both phone lines and fibre lines, myself / my businesses with extra expense which might have been avoidable, but as another contributor said, four lines and fibre connections is small-fry in the big scheme of things to OR.

If Fibre ever does come back, and I manage to get it, I will let you all know. Interestingly and as Mr Saffron originally said, it could be for any number of reasons, as some contributors have reported months and years waiting for capacity and in the case of Bobble_bob just days.

From a failed card or new card required, to a new cabinet or failed fibre feeds from the exchange - who knows? If only there was a way of pin-pointing a cabinet and finding out what the problem was with OR......but then perhaps it would be too simple.

Just wish that OR could give some indication of how long, no guarantees of course, but it would allow customers to plan a work-around in the interim. If anyone else can shed more light it would of course be appreciated.

Once again many thanks to all on this thread - a great community and source of balanced information!!

As the OP I promised an update.....

Recap - Originally ordered some new lines and Fibre products at the back end of October. Orders accepted and Fibre continued to show available for just short of a week after placing order. Then the Fibre orders were rejected. - website no longer showing fibre. Briefly and I mean briefly for a period of just one hour the cabinet showed orders available on Thursday and then this was removed again. Not going well so far...

Openreach was booked to visit yesterday to install lines. I (after cancelling meetings), along with employees and other people, were onsite all day from 07:00 through 17:00 (although AM appointments 08:00-13:00).

No sight of anyone from OR, Kellys etc.!
No direct communication from OR!
No communication from OR to ISP - brilliant! Actually not, but there is no point in shouting-off on this forum.

This whole game just gets better - doesn't it?!!!........

I have said it before, but I fail to understand why OR cannot communicate, at the very least to the ISP, specifically:

a) when perhaps they might be able to address the fibre availability issue, and;
b) presumably due to unforeseen circumstances, why does OR fail to communicate with anyone in the process, that they would not, or could not attend their committed date for line installs. Whilst I appreciate that it is a huge organization, with large logistics and new problems / faults faced everyday, it gives the end customer, and presumably the ISP, the impression of total chaos and firefighting. If I ran my businesses in this manner I would go bust in short order!

Next week I have to move on an alternative for my employees. Can anyone recommend a good satellite service? Cost is not important, reliability, quality of connection and service is.

Many, many thanks in advance for anyone that can help with either the lines / fibre issues, or the satellite question.

In reply to a post by Mendip:

Openreach was booked to visit yesterday to install lines. I (after cancelling meetings), along with employees and other people, were onsite all day from 07:00 through 17:00 (although AM appointments 08:00-13:00).

No sight of anyone from OR, Kellys etc.!
No direct communication from OR!
No communication from OR to ISP - brilliant! Actually not, but there is no point in shouting-off on this forum.

Openreach launched a 'View My Engineer' service in September 2015 which sends the end customer text messages and a link to a website showing the status of the engineer allocated to their job as well as their contact number.

That is certainly what I experienced the last time I was responsible for a new telephone line being put in (last month) - in that case the CP/ISP was Sky.. and also before than when dealing with a line fault (when the CP was BT).

(and yes, the engineer for the new line was actually from Kelly's etc. though the one for the line fault was from Openreach)

Regards
Sunil

Edited by gt94sss2 (Sat 07-Nov-15 17:11:32)

Hi Sunil,

Thank you for your reply - much appreciated.

Sounds like you experienced a proactive new service, but I certainly didn't 'See my Engineer', 'View my Engineer', or 'Talk to my Engineer', or experience anything at all from OR except a complete waste of time:

No text messages;
No calls;
No Engineers from anywhere connected with OR - totally un-proactive from Openreach.

I appreciate that things go wrong, serious faults develop on the day that take priority etc., but to keep the end customer and ISP in the dark is bizarre from a communications company.

I was about to say 'no doubt', but rewording my sentence, 'perhaps' a reason will be forthcoming from OR on Monday, and then of course how long is the further delay? That's if I continue with the orders.......

Once again many thanks indeed, and perhaps hoping for better things next time, well anything really has to be better than a total no show and no communication whatsoever from Openreach!

If anyone else has any ideas I would be most grateful to hear from you, on this and any alternative solutions such as satellite.

Have you set up a 'Follow That Page' to monitor the dschecker for you?

Hi BatBoy,

Thank you for your email and help.

The site you refer to seems only to allow you to monitor a page, not interect to give the site specific details such as Post Code or Number, which are required for the BT DSL Checker. Perhaps I am missing something here, or you know of a different site, and if I am wrong I would be grateful if you could correct me.

Now 'Follow that OR Engineer' would be something else, assuming that he had actually been allocated to your orders / faults...........????

Once again many thanks, and if anyone else has any ideas, thoughts, experiences I would appreciate it.

In reply to a post by Mendip:

Sounds like you experienced a proactive new service, but I certainly didn't 'See my Engineer', 'View my Engineer', or 'Talk to my Engineer', or experience anything at all from OR except a complete waste of time

Yes, I was pleasantly surprised.

I think Zen - as your CP/ISP - may need to set it up/request the service and pass on your contact details etc...other firms are managing to do so

Given this new functionality has been formally released by Openreach (rather than a trial) I would assume its now nationwide..

Thats not to say Openreach are perfect i.e. if they fail to allocate an engineer or delay work for other reasons by any means

BT's recent press release on this last month includes:

Joe Garner, the Openreach chief executive, said there was more to do on service. He emphasised his organisation�s progress on service, exceeding all 60 Ofcom service standards in 2014/15, as well as hiring 3,000 extra engineers, reducing installation waiting times, fixing faults faster and halving complaints. Garner made clear his ambition to exceed by 6% Ofcom�s 2017 minimum standards for delivering new connections on time.

He also cited �View My Engineer� as a key step forward. This is a new service which gives customers text progress updates plus their engineer�s name and mobile number should they need to make contact.

He highlighted an issue which arises ecause customers often cannot deal direct with Openreach, but can only deal with their retail broadband provider. Garner declared he is open to having Openreach deal directly with end customers, subject to consulting Ofcom and telecom providers.

Possible one reason they can't tell Zen what is going on is that they need to tell all ISPs at the same time due to regulation?

Or Zen have messed up your order somehow? (no idea)

Would be interesting to know what would have happened if you had been a A&A customer instead..

Edited by gt94sss2 (Sat 07-Nov-15 18:19:23)

Instructions here http://forums.thinkbroadband.com/fibre/t/4313768-how...

Hi gt94sss2,

Many thanks for your email.

Or Zen have messed up your order somehow? (no idea)

Just come off the phone to them. I am not sure, but they advise that OR notified them of a delay to the provisioning at 19:30 the evening after the missed morning appointments - great! This really isn't balanced at all - if I did that circa £300 down the drain.

Would be interesting to know what would have happened if you had been a A&A customer instead..

I never thought I would ever say this, but I am seriously thinking of leaving Zen. I have been with them for just short of 20 years and I have never experienced a problem they couldn't resolve quickly, and with good communication, but something has changed and they are not the company they used to be. Perhaps it just me, but when Richard Tang set up the company, I remember no if's or but's, military / mission reliable internet with no limits and excellent communication. Now I am struggling to even get responses to emails sent a week ago and I am a corporate customer!

Perhaps A&A is the way forwards, and I can take the whole lot there (lines, broadband, domains, hosting). The only problem is OR are still in the system though, but perhaps A&A can communicate better, like Zen used to.

Batboy,

Thank you for your guide. I have set it up, but you guessed it no change, no fibre....


The saga continues..........currently no lines, no fibre, no timescale, no idea...............

As the OP of this thread, a further update........

Since the order for new lines and fibre a month ago, well not much has happened, except:

Zen, my ISP, has started to become more responsive, providing the standard of service they used to; this perhaps only after escalating the issue. Perhaps they were going through staffing issues.

As for the lines (forget Fibre at this stage), so far one OR Engineer has been sighted. He actually came to find one of my employees, and explained he was doing 'a pair divert'. The interesting point I find difficult to understand is the tools and information he is given, and I quote 'from some Exchanges outwards we have no mapping, no diagrams, no records of vast swathes of the country for the last 10 or 20 years, thus the only way to find new lines, is to go out and look for them, cut them into a circuit and try it out'.

In this 'connected world', where we are aiming to put people on Mars, place the entire planet on the web, and place everything on the IOT, surely it is not beyond the wit of man, in this case Openreach, to keep records of their network, the network capability and capacity, and their current modus operandi goes a long way to explaining Openreachs inability to:

a) communicate anything (initially they don't know the unknown unknowns), and;
b) deliverance of service (until they make the unknown unknowns known unknowns), they have no idea how long it will take!.

What on Earth has BT been doing with Openreach for the last 20 years?

To be clear, I have no issue with any Engineer that actually tries to get the job done, in fact they have my sympathies and respect in achieving what they do with such limited information, but how on Earth has the company that runs the backbone of the country infrastructure become so disorganised?

Anyway, back to the original post, ordered new lines, new fibre broadband over a month ago, no lines and no fibre yet, 'computer (cabinet) still says no' - not available, but a whole load of excuses, delays, and missed appointment without warning to me or the ISP.

By this point I would be tearing my hair out, but in the interim I ordered and had installed Avanti Satellite Business broadband. Start to finish the process took one week, on time, no excuses, no delays, and good communication all the way. The service is actually better than I expected, and sufficient for the moment to meet the business unit needs, and will keep it as a fail-over route for the fibre - if it ever becomes available again and is fitted; this dependent of course on the lines arriving in the first place!

It has however taken the pressure off (me) waiting for Openreach to deliver (or communicate) anything, and the whole process has become more of a daily amusement. I still await the new lines, and the fibre products, but I do not hold any confidence in Openreach (or its sister company BT) to deliver anything soon.



The saga continues......... will lines and fibre arrive before the snow and Christmas?

Odds anyone?...........

Edited by deleted (Sun 22-Nov-15 07:53:08)

In reply to a post by Mendip:

The interesting point I find difficult to understand is the tools and information he is given, and I quote 'from some Exchanges outwards we have no mapping, no diagrams, no records of vast swathes of the country for the last 10 or 20 years, thus the only way to find new lines, is to go out and look for them, cut them into a circuit and try it out'

Actually I think the engineer was probably nearer to the truth than you might think. My own nearest cabinet became marked up as 2/1 as a result of fibre coming along - we were fed from Cabinet 2. Before that it had no numbers whatsoever. It's now known as Cabinet 3. Seems while the local engineers knew where the cabinets in our village were located, on the system they might as well as been in a black hole. They just didn't exist.

As for OR communicating (or lack of) planned work etc, I think you'd have to wait for a change of ownership (or a regulator that gets off their backside) before that ever happens. Indeed, I found it far more handy to look at such places as roadworks.org to find out what was happening when it came to the fibre cabinet install, rather than wait for any scraps of info that OR let slip. Even our local BDUK seemed to struggle to get info of future planning. I came to the conclusion that OR just don't plan!

Speed test

Edited by 69bertie (Sun 22-Nov-15 10:00:48)

In reply to a post by 69bertie:

As for OR communicating (or lack of) planned work etc, I think you'd have to wait for a change of ownership (or a regulator that gets off their backside) before that ever happens. Indeed, I found it far more handy to look at such places as roadworks.org to find out what was happening when it came to the fibre cabinet install, rather than wait for any scraps of info that OR let slip. Even our local BDUK seemed to struggle to get info of future planning. I came to the conclusion that OR just don't plan!

Not for me to defend Openreach/BT - and I'm sure their staff can comment on the accuracy over the state of their records etc.

However, what I would say is that Openreach maintains over 120million Km of wires - and has what - 80/85K? PCPs.

But they certainly do plan and quite far in advance - iinstalling FTTC has been described as one of the biggest engineering (or project management?) tasks in Europe atm.

I would have to agree with the conclusion that they have obviously reached that as a regulated utility their priority has to be on building out their network and meeting BDUK targets - not on employing lots of staff informing the public about the state of individual Cabinets, their roll out plans or why/where something has been delayed/changed instead

This is obviously despite my own interest/curiosity about what is going on which many people obviously share.

Not directed at you, but I have been amazed at times about the level of detail some expect BT (or other firms) to supply about their own specific circumstances - when such firms need to manage things on a regional/national basis - so some plans will take longer others will be quicker/easier than planned.. - especially when we are technically not even their customers.

A change of ownership, separating Openreach from BT or a more active regulator would NOT change any of the above.

Regards
Sunil

In reply to a post by 69bertie:

In reply to a post by Mendip:

The interesting point I find difficult to understand is the tools and information he is given, and I quote 'from some Exchanges outwards we have no mapping, no diagrams, no records of vast swathes of the country for the last 10 or 20 years, thus the only way to find new lines, is to go out and look for them, cut them into a circuit and try it out'

Actually I think the engineer was probably nearer to the truth than you might think. My own nearest cabinet became marked up as 2/1 as a result of fibre coming along - we were fed from Cabinet 2. Before that it had no numbers whatsoever. It's now known as Cabinet 3. Seems while the local engineers knew where the cabinets in our village were located, on the system they might as well as been in a black hole. They just didn't exist.

As for OR communicating (or lack of) planned work etc, I think you'd have to wait for a change of ownership (or a regulator that gets off their backside) before that ever happens. Indeed, I found it far more handy to look at such places as roadworks.org to find out what was happening when it came to the fibre cabinet install, rather than wait for any scraps of info that OR let slip. Even our local BDUK seemed to struggle to get info of future planning. I came to the conclusion that OR just don't plan!

That's just it; the knowledge-base is retained in the heads of (older) local linesmen. Wisdom that's not formally recorded, nor shared with younger colleagues, nor with the outsourced upstarts from Kellys and Quinns.

The official database of BT Network Records is in a dreadful mess; poorly maintained and often obsolete. In our case, BT records a "billing address" -- our actual postal address -- which is quite different to the "supply address"; which BT insists is in the next village!

The lack of communication on BT's project works is reminiscent of Soviet state industry, from behind the Iron Curtain in the days of Stalin. Projects commissioned and executed in absolute secrecy. With neither public knowledge nor prior input. Residents would literally come home from work one day to find a new tower block being constructed in their district without any prior notice!

At least we have roadworks.org to give us a hat-tip of BT's planned works in our district.

Better to spin-off Openreach as a separate operation? Could it be any worse?

In reply to a post by edwincluck:

reminiscent of Soviet state industry, from behind the Iron Curtain in the days of Stalin

I find this quite funny. From your previous posts, this is precisely the state you wish our comms industry were in!

As the original OP, I thought I would provide a summary update��


Lines are installed, two months after order � a positive move.

Fibre yet to arrive � it is available again, and ordered, and promised by the end of the week.


What I have learnt during the process thus far:



� OR have a huge machine to run, on that they have my respect. However the OR machine does not appear to functioning well from a customer or ISP perspective.

� There is no way to speed up anything. There is no way to have a definitive answer as to whether anything will happen in an expected time frame, until a Field Engineer goes and has a look.

� The internal communication between Engineers (e.g. handover notes such as you will need a Cherry Picker) is non-existent.

� The OR machine takes time to update. It appears to take anything between 48 hours and 1 week for any work to show on their system, which an ISP can interrogate and in-turn tell the customer.

� The Field Engineers I have met have all been extremely proactive, knowledgeable and helpful, but all appear �in the dark� with information about orders and previous work conducted.

� My ISP (Zen) initially provided very poor customer service in chasing matters with OR on these orders � this being a real shock for me, as Zen has always been my first choice for business for 20 years. Subsequently they improved, but I still feel that Zen have lost their edge as one of the best ISPs. I put this down to current staffing issues. Interestingly I see other people having problems obtaining information from OR via Zen, and I am beginning to see a link here.

Re: Openreach being a bottleneck for internet to a new build

I think gt94sss2 that sadly you might have something here about Zen. Some posters gave me this impression, and I think your kind nudges were perhaps correct. To my mind Zen�s computer system is similar to OR, runs at one speed, throws up error�s, and little can be done. When tracking orders online, I am constantly told by customer services to ignore the information shown. What point is a customer tracking portal, if the information is to be disregarded? In my opinion, I still regard Zen as being up there as 'one of the best', but they are (currently) not as good as they used to be.

� The FTTC to the cabinet issue was only one card initially installed. A big thank you to all who helped with information and pointers!

� The cabinet has now been fully populated and available to order again �this happened two weeks ago, and I found this out from the OR Engineers on site � Zen had no idea and kept telling me that most likely I had to wait for someone to move in order to release connections.

� Thanks to everyone who helped with information. It would just be so useful for customers and businesses to plan, if OR could give a rough estimate as to when they conduct this work. My cabinet went from Available (original orders placed), to Non available (no reason � no plan, after 7 days and orders rejected by OR) like a flip-flop on a daily basis, then no plans for 2 weeks, then exploring solutions for a week, then available to order but not yet due to lack of capacity for two weeks, then not available again, and then High Demand, and finally Available to order, all in the space of 8 weeks. Note for anyone interested, it took just short of two weeks from the cabinet being fully populated to being able to order again.

� The Track My Engineer feature that I mentioned didn�t appear on the missed OR appointments, did happen when OR turned up, so Zen do use this, but don�t tell you about it, or perhaps more importantly to expect it.

So where am I now?

One very good Avanti Business Satellite Internet feed.
Phone lines installed.
FTTC lines arriving this week, maybe, and thus I should have what I original wanted in early October, but with extra resilience / backup / fail-over, of the Satellite connection.

Then the business unit will be on track.


But will it be before Christmas���.? I will let you know.

I agree with most of what you've written but this in particular resonates with me:-

In reply to a post by Mendip:

My ISP (Zen) initially provided very poor customer service in chasing matters with OR on these orders � this being a real shock for me, as Zen has always been my first choice for business for 20 years. Subsequently they improved, but I still feel that Zen have lost their edge as one of the best ISPs. I put this down to current staffing issues. Interestingly I see other people having problems obtaining information from OR via Zen, and I am beginning to see a link here.

Zen are "dealing" with a similar saga for me. 7 weeks have passed since order and I still dont have a working phone or broadband connection. I had initially thought Zen were fighting my corner and the problem was Openreach but as time goes on I'm not so convinced that Zen are doing everything they could be doing.

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

Instructions here http://forums.thinkbroadband.com/fibre/t/4313768-how...

Just replied to that thread to advise that the latest VERSION number is also used in FollowThatPage links as the page returned does vary... with the current lines cards in my (partly populated) cabinet full, using the latest VERSION shows Waiting List and FTTC estimates; using an old VERSION shows nothing about FTTC at all!

Edited by deleted (Mon 14-Dec-15 14:25:07)

As the OP of this post, the latest and final update of my saga......


After two months, lines are in, fibre is installed and working!

Quite a good setup really, being influenced by lack of information and delays from OR, 3 fibre lines and 1 Avanti business Satellite broadband link, feeding into a Draytek 3900, giving the business unit flexibility and redundancy.


I would not have considered the Satellite broadband initially, but when the order pasted the initial promised 12 days, I had to do something, and I have to say I am impressed with the Satellite service. It is on par with the Fibre in terms of speed (15Mb/s), but of course the latency is higher. However this is not a problem for the business.


Summary:


� If your order passes the initial order timescale estimate, you are in 'the dark zone'! Little information is forthcoming from OR as to when a resolution may or will be completed.

� I have become knowledgeable on all the various sites where you can obtain information, from where your cabinet is, the status, the technology inside it, number of premises covered, future plans etc., none of which is obtainable from OR, or in my case my ISP - Zen. In fact I obtained far more detailed information about capacity increases from the local council, than I ever did from OR or my ISP, and even totally incorrect information from Zen.

� In my opinion my ISP Zen has lost it edge as being the best ISP. They used to be perfect, proactive, and professional, and whilst in my opinion based on my latest dealings (see earlier in thread), they are still �up there� as one of the best, they have really slipped, and I cannot help feeling that the lack of information was in some part due to them. Would I use them for future orders? I would have to think about it, whilst in the past I would not have hesitated! Either they have current staffing issues, or are changing their core costumer target, and morphing into �a one size fits all, pile it high, sell it cheap, no customer service� provider � I really hope not, it would be such a shame to see a good company that strived to be the best deteriorate - I remember when Richard Tang started it with the slogan 'Military grade Internet, with military grade reliability and service'. Time will tell.

� OR Engineers are a credit to their company and I cannot fault their professional up-beat attitude when attending, in spite of the fact that each and every one of them admits that the company does not provide any handover notes from previous visits, and �the flow of information within the company is terrible / non-existent� - their words not mine.

� I understand that OR is a huge machine, and it puzzles me how it runs in its current modus operandi. OR appears to break down everything into tiny tasks to achieve for an example a line install. This looks good on paper, however when factoring in that an Engineer will be needed for each 'chunk' and then factor in traveling, manpower availability on the day, lack of any handover notes, and lack of tools equipment (that could have been prompted / avoided by handover notes), it appears in my opinion, being a Director of several businesses, to be overly complicated. Indeed I can recall the days (only a couple of years ago) when a line install request was made, the whole process was conducted by one Engineer, and in one day (everything from the Exchange, drop wires, and commissioning)! Now this does not seem possible, and indeed the Engineers have told me that in fact they are not allowed to do this, even if they have the time. There must be a much bigger picture somewhere that I and the Engineers in the field are missing, as it does not appear efficient to me or them.

� Thus the lines, FTTC connections and Satellite connection are all up and running, and I can leave my guys in this location to work unhindered now. It would have just been so helpful if at the beginning of the process, or close to it, OR could have said, sorry pair diverts needed � delay 1 month, FTTC capacity run out, but delay 2 months. No problem I would have said � business is all about finding solutions and working around problems. What I didn�t appreciate were several appointments where OR didn�t even bother to notify that they were not going to turn up, until 26 hours after the event, as at that stage they didn�t even know they needed pair diverts!! This point still amazes me, that once away from the Exchange, OR have no idea what actually is out there, and perhaps therein lies the problem, and perhaps to quote Donald Rumsfeld � this should be the Openreach mantra about their network until a site visit is conducted:

� (Suggested) Openreach customer service commitment: There are known knowns. There are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say there are things that we now know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don't know we don't know - until you put an order in for a new line or fibre product, and we can find an Engineer to go out and have a look to see what is there, or perhaps more importantly not there!


Project finished here, new business unit starting in February � first move Satellite in, then order lines and fibre � lesson learned!


Finally many thanks to everyone on this forum. You have all been very helpful in different ways, and this site is a brilliant and professional place for information. Many, many thanks to the people that take the time and resources to run it!



Merry Christmas to one and all!

Edited by deleted (Fri 18-Dec-15 09:08:24)

Been finding many of these FTTC "waiting" posts lately, it seems openreach in their usual wisdom are trying to save pennies by only installing minimum line capacity at each cabinet, I expect an accountant thinks they been clever by having customers waiting frustrated.

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

Been finding many of these FTTC "waiting" posts lately, it seems openreach in their usual wisdom are trying to save pennies by only installing minimum line capacity at each cabinet, I expect an accountant thinks they been clever by having customers waiting frustrated.

It actually makes perfect sense and Openreach have been doing this since day 1 - simply as there is no point installing extra line cards where there is no demand. This also means that when they do install new line cards, they will be the latest generation/model they have.

What has caught them out is that the system is designed to place an order for a new line card when they existing one is 60-80%(?) full meaning that in theory a new line card should be fitted in good time - before the old one is full.

What is happening on some cabinets is that initial demand is so great they 'sell out' almost immediately meaning they can't pro-actively install a new line card.

That and FTTC is more popular now as awareness increases meaning that what was probably a slow burn on new Cabinets is now can be much faster - but I guess Openreach really don't know how much demand there will be especially on BDUK funded cabs -at least they now have a waiting system in place, before they would just refuse the additional orders.

Thanks for keeping us updated on the progress of your orders - I'm glad its all sorted now

In reply to a post by gt94sss2:

What has caught them out is that the system is designed to place an order for a new line card when they existing one is 60-80%(?) full meaning that in theory a new line card should be fitted in good time - before the old one is full.

What is happening on some cabinets is that initial demand is so great they 'sell out' almost immediately meaning they can't pro-actively install a new line card.

This happened to us; new cabinet which we'd been actively campaigning for, initial capacity sold out in about 60 hours. To be fair Openreach did then install an extra card only 5 days later, which took another couple of days to register, so fibre was available again after 7 days in total. We did prompt Openreach's programme team who we've been liaising with about ours (and all outstanding commercial cabinets in Hampshire which we're chasing them to deliver), so that may have helped.

In reply to a post by gt94sss2:

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

Been finding many of these FTTC "waiting" posts lately, it seems openreach in their usual wisdom are trying to save pennies by only installing minimum line capacity at each cabinet, I expect an accountant thinks they been clever by having customers waiting frustrated.

It actually makes perfect sense and Openreach have been doing this since day 1 - simply as there is no point installing extra line cards where there is no demand. This also means that when they do install new line cards, they will be the latest generation/model they have.

I agree - no point in wasting money on cards that won't be used for a couple of years. Much more useful to use this year's budget to buy more cabs.

Likewise, the jointers are a limited resource. Why have them wiring in tie pairs that aren't needed for another couple of years on day 1? Why not have them move to another cab that has no tie pairs at all yet?

We have an idea of just how many cabinets have needed a full complement of resources, because BT have shown us a snapshot of their cabinets. See this thread for more details - especially the link to the table of numbers

That snapshot detailed 34,000 cabinets, where 18,000 cabinets - more than half - were on their first card, and 11,000 had progressed to a second card. Only 0.2% of cabinets were approaching full capacity.

What has caught them out is that the system is designed to place an order for a new line card when they existing one is 60-80%(?) full meaning that in theory a new line card should be fitted in good time - before the old one is full.

BT have said the threshold is 75%.

I've also seen the jointers fitting new tie-pairs in a cabinet in good time too: They added tie-pair cables to a cabinet just outside the house over a couple of days recently, but availability of the cabinet had never disappeared.

it makes sense if you care about short term expenditure only.

Typical accountant thinking to think its a good thing to have customers waiting rather than over provisioning.

more line cards are a very small % of the cost of rolling out a cabinet.

The expensive part is done regardless of how many cards are in place.

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

it makes sense if you care about short term expenditure only.

Actually, it makes perfect long term sense as well.

As WWWombat posted there are relatively few cabinets at any one time with their line cards approaching capacity/full - and even though many cabinets will have been deployed for years they are still on their first line card-so gradually filling them makes sense

Off the top of my head, the advantages of doing it for Openreach include:

- they can deploy newer/better line cards when available (i.e. those supporting G.Fast or vectoring) for faster/cheaper rather than having a lot of older generation cards ones unused and lying around;

- it allows them to use their or the BDUK funds to ensure fibre passes more premises for the same budget;

- if the CapEx figure is lower, this makes it easier for Openreach to eventually write it of and upgrade to G.Fast or FTTP

- it makes their business case more affordable so more cabs are commercially viable.

- installing excess/unused capacity would probably mean their charges to customers would have to go up

You make a point about over provisioning but that is effectly what Openreach do by installing capacity for 48 lines to start with not knowing what demand there will be - and unless there has been 'high demand' etc. the process of fitting the extra cards should be transparent to the end user

Taking your argument to the extreme would mean them provisioning fibre for ever single landline customer even though they know take-up is not going to be 100%

Edited by gt94sss2 (Sun 20-Dec-15 05:06:38)

The expensive bit is the labour costs involved in getting fibre to the cabinet, power, copper links re-instating any pavements, building plinths etc

While I disagree on the percentage issue (each small % can be the difference between commercial viability and otherwise), I'll still point you to BT's new longer-term targets: a maximum of 30% take-up.

With a largish 400-line PCP, they're expecting 133 lines to take FTTC long-term. That is still only half of the capacity of a full-size Huawei MA5603. The statistics showed 93% of 5603's were at less than half capacity, highlighting this very clearly.

Their belief is that, not only are some of these line cards not needed yet, but they're not ever going to be needed. Why pay for those?

An PCP sized with the average 300 lines is only expected to take 100 FTTC ports long-term. In that case, it wouldn't even need additional tie-pairs plumbing in.

And that brings us to the part you ignored - the other resource that needs to be added: tie pairs. That is much more labour-intensive than the line card, even if they don't need to dig more duct into the ground, and will be one of the critical paths in bringing capacity to an area. I think it is key to keep the jointing teams working in areas where the demand is, rather than where the demand isn't.

How is this different to providing electricity, water and gas?? Sorry, but this seems a copout to me.