BT FTTP a word of warning.

Thought I might post this here lest anyone else end up in my situation.

Had FTTC 80/20 at this time already, but saw the openreach van at the cabinet near my house, with what was quite clearly fibre runs being "shoved" down into the street opening.

Glory be, about a month later I saw FTTP 1000/220 available to my premises, and ordered 330/50 FTTP.

OpenR guy came out to survey, which was a two min conversation, no prob.

Day of install, they automatically cancelled the FTTC, but had moved somehow the FTTP date, without moving the date for the original FTTC cut off, leaving me without internet access at all.

No email notification about moving the install of FTTP, or that the FTTC was going to be ceased, so I had no way of alerting BT.

4G sucks btw

Regards
D

Well I would be on the phone to BT's Complaints team and demand (but at the same time being polite) for the FTTC to be re-enabled until the FTTP was live.

There is no reason why they couldn't keep the FTTC until the FTTP was live, they are both over different mediums.

Like when we moved from ADSL2+ to FTTP, our FTTP install had issues and was cancelled twice I think, but our ADSL2+ connection was still live.

It was only a few days after our FTTP connection went live and the executive complaints / chairman's office phoned up to ask if everything was ok and that we was happy with how it was all dealt with and then the compo team phone call 30 mins after and was agreed with, was when the ADSL 2+ line was deactivated.

So both of our connections overlapped by 3 to 5 days, so they can overlap.

TBH I think this was done by mistake, these things do happen.

But I would phone BT and explain and make a complaint, this might allow for the FTTC to be temporary activated assuming there is a free port at the cabinet.

Also it was their mistake not yours, so it "should" be at their cost to resolve.

BTW, how long is it till the FTTP is now to be installed?

Paul

In reply to a post by PaulKirby:

There is no reason why they couldn't keep the FTTC until the FTTP was live, they are both over different mediums.

Unless they were porting the voice number over to FVA and allowed that to complete in the background. It would have ceased the line and any associated services with it.

Matt

In reply to a post by uno:

In reply to a post by PaulKirby:

There is no reason why they couldn't keep the FTTC until the FTTP was live, they are both over different mediums.

Unless they were porting the voice number over to FVA and allowed that to complete in the background. It would have ceased the line and any associated services with it.

While this might be true, but the OP never said the line was ceased, so I was going by that information.

But yeah, FVA does make this more complicated, our FVA was done once the ADSL2+ was stopped.

Paul

Update..

I called BT the morning it went offline, and they explained that the FTTC cancellation was automatic.
I like you assumed that as FTTP uses glass, FTTC uses copper, there would be no requirement for a service outage.

Problem was they had to essentially re-order FTTC to re-instate that product, and that was going to come with the regular installation delay i.e 2 weeks.

I grumbled, and asked for the BT mini hub, they ignored this request.

They managed to get onto the faults team, even thought this was not actually a fault in their eyes, and move the "installation" date to Monday.

Later, still unhappy, I rang again as my new product is the "Plus" version.
I'm informed that when a qualifying fault is logged on the service, the BT mini Hub is shipped automatically.
Eventually they managed to sort it, along with unlimited data on the kids phones until the "fault" is resolved.

I hadn't considered the actual migration of the telephone number, but would guess I wouldn't be alone there, like many I'm sure, don't have a handset attached to the line.

D

Well if its all automatic you would of thought their system would of checked that the new service was in place and live before cancelling the old service.

But like I said these things can happen.

I think we were lucky and BT was treading carefully due to our local MP and myself sending several emails and phone calls to the CEO and chairman's office about our issues.

But yeah once our FTTP was all live and our ADSL2+ was deactivated I then had our phone moved over to FVA (keeping our current / existing phone number), I just wanted to get off our very bad copper line that use to die when it become windy and rainy etc.

Word of waring if you move your phone over to FVA you will be charged I think £35 for the cease of the old copper line, BT didn't tell us about that, but I brought that up in the compo phone call and it was refunded.

Paul

Edited by PaulKirby (Sat 15-Dec-18 10:08:06)

Whats the situation with FVA? I had a FTTP connection installed in November, but my voice service is still on the old copper line, I thought this was the 'default' for brown field installations. I was chatting with neighbour the other evening, he has also placed an FTTP order, but he's been told he needs a new phone number (I'm sure this is wrong, but assume it's because the random order processing system has allocated him FVA)

BTs systems offered me FVA when I upgraded my FTTP from 80/20 to 150/30. The order then got stuck for a few weeks before being reissued without FVA. We're still on copper for voice....

I presume the exchange needs to be suitably equipped to support (to route local number calls appropriately) so perhaps my issue was that the exchange isn't setup for it - there are only <32 FTTP houses here out of >1500 after all...

Its frustrating as our copper line has failed twice since we've had full fibre and they keep having to come fix it - investing money in what should be a now obsolete copper network.

Simon

In reply to a post by SJHambly:

I presume the exchange needs to be suitably equipped to support (to route local number calls appropriately) so perhaps my issue was that the exchange isn't setup for it - there are only <32 FTTP houses here out of >1500 after all...

Nothing to do with the exchange. I don't get the option of FVA when ordering through BT Retail yet fibre only properties not far from me (new builds) do - both FTTP live & connected to the same exchange. It seems BT Retail's systems usually prefer copper rather than FVA for voice where there is both a copper and a fibre feed into a property. Obviously FVA is the only option for voice (from BT) for fibre only premises, typically new builds.

Edited by deleted (Sat 15-Dec-18 22:19:52)

In reply to a post by bedrock:

Whats the situation with FVA? I had a FTTP connection installed in November, but my voice service is still on the old copper line, I thought this was the 'default' for brown field installations. I was chatting with neighbour the other evening, he has also placed an FTTP order, but he's been told he needs a new phone number (I'm sure this is wrong, but assume it's because the random order processing system has allocated him FVA)

Well our copper line was sooooo bad and has been for years, it's possibly just an old line (not sure), but there is no good / working pairs left.

When it become windy and rainy our copper line speed would drop down to nothing and then the phone would go dead.
The engineers would come out but wouldn't be able to resolve the issue apart from re-do the joints and that it.
I was also told by the engineers when they were here at the time and also BT over the phone that a new additional set of copper cables pairs would not be installed just for the one line, which is fine and I agree with.

This was why as soon as we were able to order FTTP we decided on getting everything off the copper line, so when I placed the order over the phone I also asked for the phone service to also be moved over to FVA too, and that we need to keep the same current phone number which they said ok.

Where our FVA Service started 3 to 5 days after our FTTP went live which was also when our ADSL2+ service stopped, the engineer that installed the FTTP left the phone cable from the ONT tacked along the skirting and by the NTE5A Master Socket and said once the TEL1 light on the ONT was lit to swap the two wires over in the master socket and phone the 6 digit phone number and follow the instructions and if I wanted to terminate the cables back to the BT80 box, and then job done.

So now our copper line is terminated at the BT80 Box.

TBH, I think you need to actually ask for the phone service to be moved over to FVA and that you want that FVA service to use your current phone number.

Now if you are in an area that only has FTTP and has no copper then the phone service might be over FVA assuming a phone service is being provided that is.

The way I see it, if you have no issues on your copper line and that you have FTTP, then there is no need to move it over, you gain nothing doing so apart from a one of cease fee of about £35, you still have line rental over FVA.

Paul