Totally Wrong Price Comparison Site FTTP Availability Info

I have hunted high and low on both this website and more generally on the internet and I can find no discussion on this point at all, not even by the learned ThinkBroadband itself or its main well known (but I would also say somewhat lesser) rival.

Specifically that virtually all the main price comparison sites appear to have totally and utterly wrong data for BT exchanges that offer FTTP connections for an individual address but don't offer FTTC (the normal situation on any BT exchange that is cabled up for FTTP where the only other broadband option is ADSL2+ that BT Retail itself will no longer now let you order but its competitors all will). So in a nutshell all of these wrong price comparison sites (there only appears to be one price comparison site that is even aware BT FTTP is available at my address and indeed also has been for nearly 5 years) just show the only broadband options as being ADSL2+ except that they all (so I presume all these price comparison sites in fact use the same erroneous third party database) wrongly show that 145Mbps and 300Mbps EE G.Fast services are available at my address. Whereas in fact both BT Fibre 900 and Fibre 500 are available here but not one broadband price comparison site manages to show this and the only price comparison site that even knows FTTP is available here (Uswitch) only shows the old BT 300/30 FTTP service as being the fastest available.

So taking the main broadband price comparison sites the only one that seems to have almost correct data for postcode RH5 5GA is www.uswitch.com who do manage to show BT Fibre 300 and BT Fibre 150 services available here at £49.99 and £39.99 per month but they then tarnish this result by also showing EE by claiming that 300Mbps Fibre Max 1 and 145Mpps Fibre Max 2 services are available at £43,00 and £35.00 per month on an 18 month contract with a £25 setup fee.. But EE Fibre Max 2 and Fibre Max 1 are in fact G.fast services as indicated on their web page at https://ee.co.uk/help/help-new/broadband-and-landlin... and G.Fast is not even available at my address or indeed anywhere else on the Capel, Surrey (THCP) exchange as confirmed by the BT Wholesale checker at www.broadbandchecker.btwholesale.com/#/ADSL

Which Switch, Compare The Market, Moneysupermarket and Confused (who all appear to use the same wrong database, although EE would possibly seem to be responsible for erroneously giving the impression their G.Fast service are available on every BT exchange in the country) all claim the only broadband option available here is ADSL2+ (plus the in reality non existent EE G.Fast options) and even wrongly claim that is the case for BT.

As BT Retail have managed to correctly show FTTP as being available here for 4 or more years and indeed the majority of my neighbours in other flats are already connected to the FTTP cable through a rather unsightly set of little external junction boxes in the hall (not sure if this is the ONT or not) to the ugly fibre cables tacked high up the wall that was all that BT Retail were prepared to pay for (this was a Race To Infinity exchange winner that BT was then 4 years late delivering as they preferred to take the Superfast Surrey money first from the County Council) there is no doubt that FTTP is available and does work here.

Now I'm presuming that these price comparison sites do manage to get this information correct for most other addresses that either have FTTC and ADSL2+ connection options or only ADSL2+ alone available and they may or mot get the data right for G.Fast capable addresses (the fact that EE is wrongly shown as providing G.Fast services here rather suggests the price comparison sites also mess this up too, although this may perhaps be EE;'s fault).

Now given that in 2020 FTTP is becoming a reasonably commonplace scenario (even if still in a significant minority of cases) I can't see how Ofcom allows all the price comparison sites apart from Uswitch (who simply seem to not have updated their database recently to incorporate the recently added BT Fibre 500 and 900 services) to wrongly not show the availability of FTTP services at all. Ditto it also seems disappointing that totally wrong data is being provided showing EE G.Fast services as available, although that is clearly less bad than omitting the FTTP services entirely as at least the net result is that the customer finds the G.Fast services are not available when they hit the EE website. But if BT FTTP services are not listed at all (given that none of these price comparison sites seem to exhaustively list all available FTTP providers offering products through BT fibre cables like Zen, IDNet or Aquiss even though gas and electricity comparison sites do always have an option to show all available providers at your address) then customers are going to potentially in error order ADSL2+ services thinking that nothing better is actually available.

Come to think of it I can't actually see how BT Retail hasn't become aware of this and why their marketing people aren't also chasing the price comparison sites like hell to list their FTTP services, especially when they are still listing their ADSL2+ products that BT Retail appears to no longer even wish to sell at all for new installs at an FTTP capable address (since their own websit no longer lists them).

Of course perhaps this is only my FTTP capable address that has this issue with nearly all the main price comparison sites apart from USwitch (who do show BT FTTP products as available but aren't showing the very new Fibre 500 and Fibre 900 iterations) thinking I only have access to ADSL2+ broadband services at my address but some how I doubt it when FTTP has been available for over 4 years and this appears to be a perfectly standard build that supports the very fastest possible FTTP speed (this website even claiming at www.thinkbroadband.com/packages that a 1000/110 service is available from Trunk Networks at a rather unattractive £144 per month + £60 setup)

Of course I realise that those of us who have access to FTTP are still in the vast minority but I would have thought that at least the users of this website would have noticed by now if none of the main broadband price comparison websites apart from Uswitch were listing any FTTP services as being available. Other less well known broadband price comparison sites such as broadbandgenie.co.uk, broadbandchoices.com and simplyswitch.com all also wrongly only showing ADSL2+ service from numerous providers plus the phantom non existent G.Fast services from EE as being available but no FTTP providers at postcode RH5 5GA. If anyone wants my phone number too then message me and I can send it to you by PM.

So as this seems rather a major omission by the price comparison website industry and as Ofcom in particular and also the Competition and Markets Authority would seem to be asleep at the wheel to allow this crazy situation to continue you would have thought something might be done about it.

Also surely BT Retail, Bt Openreach and BT Wholesale's staff must also be asleep at the wheel given the potential huge loss of FTTP business they are likely to suffer as a result of customers not being made aware by the price comparison website that this is available as an option and odering an ADSL2+ product from a BT competitor instead..................

Openreach FTTP was only available to just over half a million homes less than 2 years ago.
It's only in the last couple years this footprint has grown to an amount that would make it worth the price comparison sites to cover.
It's roughly 2.1 million homes covered now.

The main reason they don't compare FTTP is perhaps because there's nothing to compare.

BT is the only "big" ISP selling OpenReach FTTP.

Maybe BT don't pay big commission to price comparison sites for FTTP? They pretty much have a monopoly at the moment.

The FTTC market is competitive and there's more to compare.

When Sky, Talktalk, Vodafone etc start selling FTTP and as the footprint continues to grow I'm sure it will be added to the price comparison sites.
They get commission from ISP's after all.

Edited by j0hn83 (Mon 25-May-20 00:07:38)

In reply to a post by j0hn83:

The main reason they don't compare FTTP is perhaps because there's nothing to compare.

BT is the only "big" ISP selling OpenReach FTTP.

When Sky, Talktalk, Vodafone etc start selling FTTP and as the footprint continues to grow I'm sure it will be added.

If you are on an FTTP exchange where no FTTC options are therefore by definition available to you the relevant comparison is still with taking an over priced ADSL2+ service where you are generally likely to be paying £23 a month upwards (even though a current short term deal with NowTv and £100 Quidco cashback could mean you are only paying as little as £9.75 per month for ADSL2+ in year one) for a service as potentially slow as only 2 or 3Mbps.

Whereas at the same address you will be able to get BT Fibre Essential at 36Mbps or BT Fibre 50Mbps at the same current BT Retail price of £27.99 per month (at least on my exchange, although I don't know if BT Retail prices for FTTP go any lower on the cheaper offerings on the largest phone exchanges due to the Market 1, 2 and 3 thing or if that only related to ADSL2+) or of course BT Fibre 500 and Fibre 900 at £49.99 and £59.99 per month in the first year.

I would have thought that a price comparison website leaving out much faster FTTP services at similar price levels to what most customers pay for ADSL2+ was therefore rather a serious matter as it is likely to lead to customers making the wrong choices and the uptake of FTTP not being at the levels that Ofcom itself wants to see.

For you to just dismiss it as a minor omission because it is a new product is somewhat ridiculous when FTTP as a service has now been available in the UK for 8 or 9 years and is now available to over a million UK homes.

This omission I would say represents a shocking lack of care and due diligence by the main price comparison websites or in particular whatever third party data source it is that they all (apart from Uswitch sho seem to be making slightly more effort as one would perhaps expect from the oldest established price comparison website) obtain this data from.

It also amounts to a shocking lack of due diligence by Ofcom and the Competition and Markets Authority in failing to ensure that the data from these price comparison websites is accurate and can be relied upon......

EDIT:- BT FTTP cables were actually available to connect to in 2 million homes by December 2019 and BT are targeting 4 million homes by March 2021 (even if the COVID-19 hiatus on new installs, about to end any time soon, may slow down hitting this target a little). See www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2019/12/openreachs-fttp-broadband-build-hits-2-million-uk-premises.html

SECOND EDIT:- Also how do the price comparison websites get away without providing an option to show all available competitors (not just the ones that pay them commission if you click the right buttons as they are legally obliged to do for gas and electricity)?

The price comparison websites have a default order that is related to the commission they are paid but you can select to order by price or speed and the BT ADSL2+ option is there for my address on most of them somewhere, even though BT Retail have now stopped listing it as an order option now that they are giving dates for new FTTP connections again.

Although a couple of weeks ago they were showing ADSL2+ as the only available broadband option at my address as no installation date could then be booked for FTTP.

THIRD EDIT:- The fact that BT Retail no longer even lists an ADSL2+ as an available new order broadband option at a customer home that has FTTP available and treats it as an obsolete product is of course the reason why it is now completely unacceptable for price comparison websites not to list FTTP broadband options for any customer doing a comparison for an FTTP address that by definition will not have access to FTTC and where ADSL2+ is now considered a legacy product that BT Retail does not want customers to order.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 00:56:15)

I didn't dismiss anything and don't see any need for the
I gave you possible reasons why they don't compare FTTP.

8 years old or not it has historically had a very low footprint.

The price comparison sites are commercial businesses that are there to make profit.
They haven't seen the business case for adding FTTP until now.
They obviously aren't compelled to do so.

Write to the companies or your MP if it bothers you that much.

The utility comparison sites for gas and electricity have to give (due to regulations requiring it from their regulator OFGEM) accurate price comparison for all companies in the marketplace and not just the ones they can make money from by clicking through to switch to them (they can list the companies you can switch to with them first or you have to click another box to see the other companies but they do still have the data and it does seem to be pretty accurate). So I don't see why things should be any different with broadband but may be you can? The point of regulations is to stop naked commercial greed achieving a bad outcome for consumers. If there were no building regulations and building control then no doubt buildings would still fall down quite regularly.

You say you didn't dismiss anything but I would say you appear to have a very flippant attitude towards the duty of a price comparison website to not only make money but do what it actually says it is doing on the tin fairly and accurately.

As on an FTTP exchange you normally don't have FTTC access and may well not have ADSL2+ either (new housing estates often only have FTTP) then it is in my view quite outrageous for lazy price comparison websites to not give a comparison for services for the one fixed line broadband option you have (FTTP). There is also no excuse for leaving out FTTP products from the largest provider in the marketplace in particular. And there clearly are other providers who cover the UK for BT FTTP builds such as Zen, Idnet and Aquiss (the latter particularly targeting those who only have FTTP and not even an ADSL2+ option with lower cost and less fast FTTP products) who should all be listed on any price comparison site.

Some of the price comparison websites for broadband just don't seem to care with a number of them not only not listing FTTP options but also wrongly listing FTTC options for TalkTalk, Sky and other providers on FTTP exchanges where no such option actually exists. This is clearly because they are just too mean to pay for a proper data source. More disturbingly still some of the worst offenders are official Ofcom accredited price comparison sites listed at https://www.ofcom.org.uk/phones-telecoms-and-interne... As this doesn't happen with gas and electricity and even the smallest and newest market entrants are listed on price comparison sites I would say that Ofcom is doing a pretty bad job here just as it is in having let BT secure a monopoly for itself in most of its FTTP build areas by pricing things in such a way at the wholesale level that smaller competitors can't undercut them and larger competitors don't want to enter the market as they can't see a way to undercut BT and lure in significant numbers of customers.

I am also astounded that you apparently seem to think proper price comparisons and proper competition in FTTP don't actually matter just because it is a newer form of broadband when most people in FTTP areas are denied any real competition or choice in broadband products and often also have no decent 4G alternative either in some of the more out of the way FTTP exchange areas (such as my own where 4G data speeds average 7Mbps compared to 16Mbps on even ADSL2+)

May be you don't seem to get it (your attitude seemed to be that I was making a mountain out of a Molehill, which might have been true in 2010 re FTTP but not in 2020) because you don't live an FTTP area so don't realise how annoying it is for the only fast modern broadband service from a major company to be with BT who the regulator also allows to behave blatantly anti competitively towards any smaller rivals who try to enter the FTTP marketplace. I expect you wrongly imagine that we also have access to FTTC in these areas so think we shouldn't be getting too upset about not having access to top end FTTP speeds at low prices.

But the reality is that BT has its FTTP customers over a barrel and a corrupt and useless regulator lets a company with still massive power to dominate the fixed line phone and broadband marketplace get away with a wide range of blatantly abusive and anti-competitive practices that a decent regulator ought to come down on like a ton of bricks. But no such chanc with Ofcom's cosy Good Old Boys Club style of regulation.........

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 03:15:56)

I'm not sure I understand what your issue is. At present there's just 2 major/well known ISPs selling Openreach FTTP: BT and Zen. It takes no more than 5-10 mins to do a price comparison yourself if you're willing to put the effort in. BT will in 99% of cases be cheaper for FTTP since you can get very good discounts over the phone by haggling. You can get a BT 40/10 FTTP connection for anywhere between £20-£30/m depending on your haggling skills - that's bargain basement level pricing.

Once approx. 700 ISPs start selling Openreach FTTP - like the number currently selling xDSL services - then I'm 100% sure the price comparison websites will be updated accordingly.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 09:19:58)

In reply to a post by Highland76:

I'm not sure I understand what your issue is. At present there's just 2 major/well known ISPs selling Openreach FTTP: BT and Zen. It takes no more than 5-10 mins to do a price comparison yourself if you're willing to put the effort in. BT will in 99% of cases be cheaper for FTTP since you can get very good discounts over the phone by haggling. You can get a BT 40/10 FTTP connection for anywhere between £20-£30/m depending on your haggling skills - that's bargain basement level pricing.

The issue that you for whatever mysterious reasons don't seem to get is that most members of the public lead busy lives and unlike people inhabiting this forum are not technophile geeks expert on every last intricacy of available broadband connections for their home. Instead most of them do exactly what they would do for buying car insurance or changing utility supplier and that is to look at a price comparison website and pick the cheapest vaguely respectable looking option there.

So if they do that on all price comparison websites other than Uswitch they are going to be misled that their only available options are either an ADSL2+ connection of up to 24Mbps speed (if I get 16Mbps 0.7 miles from the exchange some people must get well over 20Mbps) or a much faster up to 300Mpbs connection with naughty TalkTalk, who seem to have provided a false database showing their Gfast service either available on every BT landline in the UK or wrongly as available on all BT FTTP enabled exchanges

Those customers may visit the TalkTalk website itself but then find that they are only offering ADSL2+ just like all the other providers they are shown by their price comparison website. So they would then make a choice of supplier from the many listed ADSL2+ suppliers and then get locked in to an up to 2 year contract (or more typically 18 months with most non BT suppliers) with massive punitive penalties for terminating early on (that now includes also paying back the subsidised lower price in the contract period they have consumed and not just all of the remaining value of the contract to the supplier) that they can't change from affordably.

So if they then later discover faster FTTP services are available they would have to try to sue their price comparison website for misleading them about choice of supplier and try to get them to pay the massive cancellation charges if cancelling early on. Charges which Ofcom of course says shouldn't exist as suppliers ought to only charge their real costs of terminating early and those ought to only be any money they have spent on an Openreach engineer visit and on admin time and not the putative future value of the contract over the rest of the up to 2 years.

The useless and incompetent regulator Ofcom sits there and states that unfair cancellation charges should not be levied for terminating early but the most dominant player, BT Retail now has 24 month minimum terms on all their actively marketed broadband connections including even ADSL2+ and FTTC or FTTP in situations where the new master socket faceplate or laying of new cable in to a customer home is not needed because it has already happened for a previous customer (so there is therefore no engineer visit to pay for). This is despite the wrong info on BT's help page at www.bt.com/help/broadband/manage-service/thinking-of-leaving-bt- falsely claiming that "If you’re still in contract with us, bear in mind you’ll have to pay the remaining charges of contract to cancel early. Most of our contracts are 12 months, but we do have some that are 18 and 24 months".

So due to misleading information from price comparison website normal customers (I'm not talking about geeks hanging out here who of course would never make this mistake) are making the wrong choice of broadband supplier while wholly unaware a better FTTP option even exists and then can't change their mind and go elsewhere for up to 2 years after making that mistake.

I don't see what part of the fact that customers in FTTP areas are being seriously and negligently misled about the right choice of broadband supplier for their home by these price comparison websites and making the wrong choice as a result and with the harm being greatly compounded by the massive penalties for terminating an up to 2 year long contract that the corrupt regulator allows that it is that you don't seem to get exactly?

By contrast in gas and electricity supply there is a huge choice of variable and also some fixed tariffs with no penalties at all for leaving just weeks or even days after you join them and even where penalties do exist on long fixed deals with the Big Six they are a mere fraction of well over £1,000 in cancellation charges levied by BT Retail for cancelling an FTTP contract early and where you are not moving your BT service elsewhere because you are either merging UK household or moving abroad.

So what part of the fact that customers will make wrong and bad choices due to wrong information from the price comparison websites and either be locked in for ages or incur huge costs to move elsewhere due to this wrong information is it that you do not seem to get?

Also I suspect you don't seem to realise that nearly all customers in an FTTP area don't have a choice of taking a much larger range of cheaper FTTC services (as they are almost never available in a BT Openreach FTTP area) and may also well not have a choice of ADSL2+ services either if they are in a new build housing estate where only FTTP cabling has been installed and no copper wiring exists. If they are also in an area with no decent 4G data speeds or may be only 2G signal or no mobile signal available (plenty of these still in NotSpots in England and all over remote rural parts of Wales and Scotland) then they are well and truly stuffed.

I don't know why exactly you seem to seek so hard to defend lazy and incompetent price comparison websites actively misleading people with wrong information and causing them substantial harm as a result but perhaps you or one of your relatives works for one of these lazy and incompetent broadband price comparison websites (that is all of them apart from Uswitch and even Uswitch are getting things wrong by not having updated to the latest situation and pricing levels on FTTP services following the launch of BT Fibre 500 and Fibre 900 to the majority of homes passed by their FTTP cabling.)?

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 10:19:03)

You appear to be under the impression that price comparison sites are there to help you. They are not. They are for the most part commercial operations there to make a profit and for this reason choose to exclude many ISP's offerings, especially from the smaller niche ISPs that are not prepared to pay commission to such sites.

So your issue is with price comparison websites. Why don't you complain to them rather than posting long rants here?

In reply to a post by MCM:

You appear to be under the impression that price comparison sites are there to help you. They are not. They are for the most part commercial operations there to make a profit and for this reason choose to exclude many ISP's offerings, especially from the smaller niche ISPs that are not prepared to pay commission to such sites.

This only happens with broadband price comparison websites and not with gas and electricity supply comparison websites, which is exactly what I am complaining about and which the useless and corrupt telecoms regulator (Ofcom) must fix. OFGEM have not exactly covered themselves in glory as a regulator but that they have got this area largely right.

Namely that gas and electricity comparison websites must show data for all players in the marketplace if you click an extra button or two to ask for this, even though by default (if you do not click the buttons asking to see all suppliers) they are allowed to show you a shorter list of only those suppliers they can earn commission from by switching you to.

I fail to see why a number of you geeks here seem to tolerate this totally unacceptable situation with broadband comparison websites both not having accurate data, omitting certain kinds of broadband completely and omitting large numbers of smaller suppliers from their listings.

Perhaps it is because as technophile geeks you like the feeling that you are the only expert masters of your universe who will make the right choices and regard with contempt ordinary mortals amongst the general public who are being actively misled by wrong information.

For the life of my I cannot see why you seek to defend the totally indefensible rather than demanding that the harm is put right and that the public is given accurate and complete information to make the correct and properly informed choice of most appropriate broadband supplier for their needs.

Your position seems to be almost like defending people getting electrocuted by dodgy wiring installations or badly made appliances as though you think it is some form of natural selection that you as a clever techno geek can take a smug satisfaction in avoiding in your own case?...........

well said, i too have native fttp but all the comparison sites still seem to think i can get 60_70 mbps from my copper when in fact i struggled to get 3. even the bt sites still dont recognise my address as having fttp

In reply to a post by Highland76:

So your issue is with price comparison websites. Why don't you complain to them rather than posting long rants here?

Because I expect other people here to care about the issue and want something to be done about it so that consumers are not misled and then make the wrong choices as a result and I would be amazed if this was not the position of those in charge of this website.

Yes I will take it up with the price comparison websites Ofcom, the Competition and Markets Authority too and bring it to the attention of the national press.

But I am extremely shocked and disappointed that there is both tolerance and apparent smug acceptance of this very bad situation by some of those who seem to hang out in and post in this discussion forum on a very regular basis

In reply to a post by Capvermell:

The issue that you for whatever mysterious reasons don't seem to get is that most members of the public lead busy lives and unlike people inhabiting this forum are not technophile geeks expert on every last intricacy of available broadband connections for their home.

The regulars on this forum give their time and opinions for free so lets not shoot the contributors.

If you have an issue with the way comparisons sites work then your best contact them in the first instance. I think we are all old enough to remember the days before comparison sites and the hassle ringing for a quote is, but if that's the only way for FTTP then that's what you will have to do.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 11:02:19)

In reply to a post by Capvermell:

I am extremely shocked and disappointed that there is both tolerance and apparent smug acceptance of this very bad situation by some of those who seem to hang out in and post in this discussion forum on a very regular basis

Why not organise a massive rally, we can all march on Westminster because you don't want to make a couple of calls to get a FTTP quote.

In reply to a post by threelegs:

well said, i too have native fttp but all the comparison sites still seem to think i can get 60_70 mbps from my copper when in fact i struggled to get 3. even the bt sites still dont recognise my address as having fttp

Many thanks for your support.

Re your address not being recognised as having FTTP at all by even BT if you were checking a week or two ago BT were also only listing ADSL2+ for my address because they had suspended FTTP new installs during the COVID-19 lockdown. But now the lockdown is being lifted they have changed their mind and the BT Retail website now only shows a plethora of FTTP options from the 36Mbps Fibre Essential through to their super duper top of the range Fibre 900 at £59.99 per month at my address an no ADSL2+ option in sight.

What is very concerning though is that BT has a 24 month contract on all these products and even on the much more expensive Fibre 500 and 900 products where the payback period to cover their initial install work should be much shorter and where the cancellation charges for terminating only a few months in are very much larger.

It is totally appalling that Ofcom does not intervene and prevent any broadband contract being longer than 12 months and also insist on 1 month contracts being available (as they are from most mobile suppliers now on SIM Only) for anyone willing to cover the initial FTTC faceplate or FTTP ONT install costs and/or of course the increasing number of cases where there are no install costs as the faceplate or ONT had already been installed for a preceding BT customer of these products. Although I believe BT Openreach still assigns some arbitrary high cost to taking over an existing FTTC faceplate or existing ONT even where no real actual on the ground cost exists.

Re broadband packages available in FTTP areas this website does a much better job in its comparison page at www.thinkbroadband.com/packages but is admittedly unfortunately still not comprehensive and seems to leave out some of the smaller, more obscure or business oriented only FTTP suppliers. These may or may not be FTTP suppliers who do not pay ThinkBroadband to appear in those listings................

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 11:07:18)

Perhaps a more serious error is the Plusnet web site which states that at a particular address:

"Our line check shows that Fibre Broadband's not yet available in your area".

Which is not true. Fibre has been available from Gigaclear for the past 5 years, just not from Openreach.

The Uswitch shows average speeds for many suppliers which are completely unattainable at that addrees.

In reply to a post by dect:

Why not organise a massive rally, we can all march on Westminster because you don't want to make a couple of calls to get a FTTP quote.

Why seek to put down someone who is campaigning for consumers to get accurate information to make a proper and informed choice of FTTP supplier. And why seek to support and excuse broadband price comparison websites supplying wholly wrong and misleading information?

Oh I know why its because that would stop making you a knowledge expert on broadband in this forum and let anyone make a correct informed choice and you clearly don't like that idea and prefer the idea that only you and other experts inhabiting this forum have the ability to do that correctly.

Its also clear that the management of this forum need to come down like a ton of bricks on posting bullies in this forum who clearly get off on belittling constructive posts made by other forum members.

In reply to a post by Michael_Chare:

Perhaps a more serious error is the Plusnet web site which states that at a particular address:

"Our line check shows that Fibre Broadband's not yet available in your area".

Which is not true. Fibre has been available from Gigaclear for the past 5 years, just not from Openreach.

The Uswitch shows average speeds for many suppliers which are completely unattainable at that address.

Thank you for your constructive contribution to this debate on broadband comparison site inadequacies.

Hopefully enough of us will join this thread to slowly drive away the smug posting bully boys of this forum (who unfortunately have a lot of time on their hands to make these negative sniping posts) who just like to show they are so clever that they would never make an error of this kind themselves in selecting their own broadband.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 11:06:07)

In reply to a post by dect:

The regulars on this forum give their time and opinions for free so lets not shoot the contributors.

No let us very actively shoot them if some of these people have developed a clearly smug and belittling style (apparently unrestrained by the forum moderators) of posting that seeks to demonstrate how much cleverer they seem to think they are are than anyone else who has less hours of their life to waste on making posts in this forum than they obviously do.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 11:11:11)

Please don't let your seeming total lack of understanding about the underlying purpose of price comparison web sites which is to make money for their operators get in the way of your having a good old pointless rant. Speaker's Corner is where you need to make your speeches rather than here.

Don't forget to ask your money back from the website that you don't agree with, oh, sorry, I forgot, it's not as if you paid a penny for their information.

In reply to a post by MCM:

Please don't let your seeming total lack of understanding about the underlying purpose of price comparison web sites which is to make money for their operators get in the way of your having a good old pointless rant. Speaker's Corner is where you need to make your speeches rather than here.

No you are quite wrong.

The purpose of these sites and I would assume especially the ones that Ofcom specifically endorses at www.ofcom.org.uk/phones-telecoms-and-internet/advice-for-consumers/costs-and-billing/price-comparison should be to give consumers an accurate basis to make an informed choice of broadband supplier whilst also allowing the site creators to make money as well.

But apparently in your world of ruthless 19th century capitalism people losing their hand or arm in the lathe is perfectly fine so long as their well off Lord Of The Manor bosses can earn enough money to keep themselves in the style to which they are accustomed.

Given your attitude I do wonder if you are perhaps a director or or shareholder in one of these incompetent broadband comparisons websites that are negligently misleading consumers and hopefully in due course may be closed down or put out of business (due to suffering large and punitive fines for their misdeeds) by a more competent or proactive telecoms regulator or competition enforcement agency.......

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 11:35:36)

In reply to a post by Capvermell:

In reply to a post by dect:

The regulars on this forum give their time and opinions for free so lets not shoot the contributors.

No let us very actively shoot them if some of these people have developed a clearly smug and belittling style (apparently unrestrained by the forum moderators) of posting that seeks to demonstrate how much cleverer they seem to think they are are than anyone else who has less hours of their life to waste on making posts in this forum than they obviously do.

I’m guessing the ‘clearly smug and belittling style’ arises from them having an informed opinion ... something you appear not to be troubled with.

The issue your opening post here stems from service providers not wishing to embrace new technology. Excuses like ‘not practical to train support staff‘ ......
Price comparison sites don’t include FTTP for similar lame arsed reasons.

But you’d be aware of this kind of thing if read informed opinion rather than ranting.

In reply to a post by Zarjaz:

The issue your opening post here stems from service providers not wishing to embrace new technology. Excuses like ‘not practical to train support staff‘ ......
Price comparison sites don’t include FTTP for similar lame arsed reasons.

But you’d be aware of this kind of thing if read informed opinion rather than ranting.

This issue is mainly only applicable to customers who live on exchanges with access to FTTP. Once a tiny and infinitessimal minority but now over 2 million and up to 4 million during the course of next year and beyond after that. We don't almost ever have access to FTTP services (of which there are many providers) and may not have access to ADSL2+ either (of which there are even more providers).

Most people would have not even be likely to know the name of or come across other FTTP providers than BT Retail on their own (even Zen is really only known of by broadband enthusiasts) so that is why it is critical price comparison websites give correct data so people either don't in ignorance not choose FTTP at all or only choose BT because they did decide to visit the BT Retail broadband website as the most obvious place to go.

Why you seem to encourage and endorse companies who do things wrong or the quick and dirty way I don't know?

But perhaps you don't ever seek out companies or organisations who make decent products or do things properly in your own life and just accept the first poorly made product you come across and also have low ambitions and expectations and low standards in relation to everything else in your life?

Ultimately you are another poster who is just trying to belittle someone for having a strongly and clearly held conviction about wanting things to be done properly. As there are so many of you with this unusual psychological profile attempting to knock me down it is tempting to believe that some of you must have a connection with price comparison sites concerned who may be concerned that their "nice little earner" without having to do things properly and thoroughly may soon be under threat..............

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 12:07:31)

Since you appear to have a problem understanding what people are telling you about these sites why don't you stop wasting our time and take your complaint, as you see it, to someone who really cares and might do something about it for you. Perhaps your MP or even the Prime Minister. This isn't a site for those with a perceived grudge about some other web sites to post about their comprehension problems.

In reply to a post by MCM:

Since you appear to have a problem understanding what people are telling you about these sites why don't you stop wasting our time and take your complaint, as you see it, to someone who really cares and might do something about it for you. Perhaps your MP or even the Prime Minister. This isn't a site for those with a perceived grudge about some other web sites to post about their comprehension problems.

Dear MCM,

Are you a moderator in this forum. No I think you are not. You are just someone with a lot of time on his hands who likes to think he is some sort of expert here by dint of taking up much of his free time making a lot of posts here.

The point of my thread discussion is perfectly valid in the context of a forum section on fibre broadband (arguably there ought to be a separate forum section on just FTTP) but apparently you have some issue with people who want to help consumers make the right FTTP choice and apparently only want there to be techno geek type discussions of things like splicing the cable or the routing path to the exchange rather than stuff that is actually useful to people wanting to get the best value service.

I have every right to start a thread and make other posts related to the accuracy of price comparison websites and their omission of FTTP services almost entirely and their carrying of wrong data re TalkTalk G.Fast services.

If you are not interested in that topic then don't read this thread any more but please stop acting like a troll and a forum bully by trying to lay down what and are not valid discussions in relation to FTTP broadband in this forum section.

If you make any more posts trying to bully me out of continuing discussing the accuracy of price comparison websites for broadband I shall be bringing your posts to the attention of the forum moderators to whom I suspect you are well known for picking on and putting down other forum members who you don't consider to share your own views on what are legitimate topics for discussion here.

You have nothing useful or constructive to contribute to this thread so please stop contributing to it any further before your actions are classified as the flaming, trolling, bullying or harassment that they so very clearly are by those in charge of the forum.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 12:27:37)

We other a commercial API solution so if other sites want to access our data for sales purposes there is a system available on commercial terms.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

We other a commercial API solution so if other sites want to access our data for sales purposes there is a system available on commercial terms.

Presumably your API would cost them more than the cheap, dirty and inaccurate data most of these sites prefer to use and I assume will continue to go on using until the inactive and incompetent regulator (Ofcom) in terms of any consumer protection agenda actually starts fining them or shutting them down for offering inaccurate and misleading information to consumers.

It is shocking that these inaccurate sites also include all of the ones that Ofcom actively endorses and promotes as allegedly meeting its standards or requirements.

As the quality of data is now a great deal better for electricity and price comparisons I feel one must lay the blame for this situation and its persistence entirely at the door of Ofcom.

There is no payment to appear on thinkbroadband listings

The reason not all are there is simply that with several hundred ISP it is an enormous task to add them all and a number of business ones do not even list pricing on their own site.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

There is no payment to appear on thinkbroadband listings

The reason not all are there is simply that with several hundred ISP it is an enormous task to add them all and a number of business ones do not even list pricing on their own site.

I think its fair to say that your listings are more complete than anyone else's.

Perhaps the regulator should therefore require that prices for all providers with more than say 20,000 or 50,000 or 100,000 customers are included.

But certainly for a regulator to have a special relationship with some broadband comparison websites that all seem to be small players but do not do the job any better than any of the big boys (who are all getting things badly wrong especially re those of us on FTTP exchanges) is very concerning indeed.

Also can we identify why all the price comparison websites wrongly think that TalkTalk can deliver up to 300Mbps G.Fast services on this ADSL2+ and FTTP only enabled exchange (at postcode RH5 5GA) Most addresses have an FTTP cable passing them, although a tiny number of very remote ones on farms or on the slopes of Leith Hil may have been excluded by BT Retail (who paid for the Race To Infinity exchanges FTTP project) on cost effectiveness grounds)

The BT Wholesale checker definitely does not show the existence of any G.Fast services for my phone number or postcode.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 12:33:01)

This is going to be a difficult one...

People are allowed opinions that disagree with a poster or highlight issues, doing so does not make them a moderator.

On the topic itself have sat in Westminster meetings and when issue was raised and pointed out that while our API is not perfect it would allow for a lot better result than is currently going on in the broadband comparison market, and importantly where people point out mistakes we are quick (generally less than 24 hours) to get the fix into the API.

We cannot join the Ofcom accreditation scheme because it requires you to list by lowest price first (apart from one featured offer), we prefer to sort by order of descending speed.

When some have been saying that comparison sites only care about the referral fees, their wording may have not been soft but ultimately that is the case and FTTP is seen as niche, that they should be so wrong and offering G.fast and FTTP products to people who have no chance to get them appears to be overlooked. Oddly one of the problems is managers running the other sites have lots of commercial experience often but little broadband knowledge.

In the original post you mentioned something about why has this site not called the comparison sites out, we have but that was some time ago now, we are trying to lead by example.

FTTP enabled exchange is irrelevant to what is available to an individual postcode.

As for identifying you will need to find out what checker engine those sites are using and what logic they are applying.

Ofcom has no special relationship beyond

Some sites pay to have their listings checked periodically by Ofcom and then are allowed to say accredited. In short you can say some sites are paying to get some links to them from the Ofcom site.

Ultimately you are another poster who is just trying to belittle someone for having a strongly and clearly held conviction about wanting things to be done properly.

No, I am belittling you (your words, not mine) for not taking time to try and understand the problem, and it’s causes, before ranting on a public forum.

We don't almost ever have access to FTTP services (of which there are many providers)

Pardon ??

In reply to a post by Zarjaz:

No, I am belittling you (your words, not mine) for not taking time to try and understand the problem, and it’s causes, before ranting on a public forum.

Your position seems to be its far too difficult to get things right and as the price comparison sites only care about making money by fair means or foul then we must expect them to run price comparison websites providing, wrong, inaccurate, incomplete or misleading data?

I don't know why this this seems to be your expectation since energy price comparison websites seem to list all the suppliers available in your area as long as you click the button saying you want them all listed and not only ones the site can switch you to or only green or ethical ones.

And broadly speaking the price comparison data is accurate despite the fact that OFGEM's crazy regulatory regime allows companies to offer 20 or more different variable price tariffs depending on the moment at which a customer joined the supplier. These multiple variable tariff inherent lead to abuse of old customers by encouraging the best prices to only be offered to new customers who's currently new tariff can then be made a legacy one in turn. But that is the fault of OFGEM for allowing this so called form of competition and not the fault of the price comparison websites.

But the price comparison website all seem to manage to capture data for all of the suppliers in any one postcode aera and list all of their currently available tariffs to new customers. So I don't know why it should be so difficult for broadband as computers would normally be as efficient in collecting and calculating data regardless of the actual product the database relates to.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 13:20:42)

In reply to a post by MCM:

Since you appear to have a problem understanding what people are telling you about these sites why don't you stop wasting our time and take your complaint, as you see it, to someone who really cares and might do something about it for you. Perhaps your MP or even the Prime Minister. This isn't a site for those with a perceived grudge about some other web sites to post about their comprehension problems.

I don't have a grudge about price comparison websites I just want consumers to be given the right price information so they make the best choice of broadband supplier. You sound rather like someone from Volkswagen taken exception to their fiddled emission data being exposed with the retort that "car still works dunnit" or something similar.

You seem to have what I would call a thing against any post someone makes about fibre broadband that is not of a technical nature involving an artisan working at the coalface linking up a piece of cable or sending data down the cable and I suspect are someone who might broadly define himself as a doer rather than a thinker, analyser or debater, although I may of course be wrong about that and you can of course tell me why you object to people making this kind of analysis of the workings of the broadband marketplace.

If you want to tell me where the forum rules say that you can't make points that may relate to the regulatory framework of the marketplace or the need for external intervention by Ofcom or the Competition and Markets Authority then I would be grateful if you can point me to the location of that requirement in the forum rules.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 13:31:37)

"But the price comparison website all seem to manage to capture data for all of the suppliers in any one postcode aera and list all of their currently available tariffs to new customers. So I don't know why it should be so difficult for broadband as computers would normally be as efficient in collecting and calculating data regardless of the actual product the database relates to."

Interesting theory for how they are listing things, but the simpler explanation is that they are being fed some data that they are not understanding and mistakenly showing lots more than they should.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

Interesting theory for how they are listing things, but the simpler explanation is that they are being fed some data that they are not understanding and mistakenly showing lots more than they should.

The general tenor of the discussion by some others here seems to be that even though broadband price comparison websites make loads of money from click thru income that we must expect them to be incompetent amateurs who are no good at what they are doing.

In any other field this would be considered as either breaking the law or negligence and lead to either criminal prosecution or civil lawsuit as a consequence of the damage they are doing through their deliberately criminally malfeasant or deliberately reckless actions.

But apparently it seems that in broadband comparison data you should be able to supply customers with any old totally wrong and misleading price comparison data you like that causes consumers to become locked in to an unusually and punitively long up to 2 year and typically 18 month long contracts that are not in their best interests without fear of facing any sanction or redress from the misled customer for doing so?

EDIT:- Seems almost as though nothing has changed re [censored] and misleading broadband comparison site data since 2016 these comments were made by the then ASA and Ofcom Chief Executives at www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2016/01/asa-uk-and-ofcom-find-advertising-of-broadband-prices-likely-to-mislead.html

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 13:44:48)

Post deleted by MrSaffron

Post deleted by MrSaffron

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 13:49:34)

Why do you repeatedly keep comparing energy suppliers to broadband suppliers on price comparison sites? You're comparing apples v oranges. In case you're not aware, when you change energy suppliers nothing physically happens to the gas & electric coming in the pipes - purely who bills you changes. As a result, nearly all (if not all) energy suppliers are available nationwide. Unlike broadband which depends on which provider has installed their infrastructure in your area or exchange - which is a lot more more complex for price comparison websites to keep up to date with.

As i said earlier, take your complaint to the price comparison websites. Having a public rant on TBB isn't going to fix anything.

You say nothing has changed since 2016, which is incorrect we have made available our API at some point in 2018 it appeared.

Keeping API up to date is a 7 day a week job, so refute that nothing has happened.

Why people are free to disagree and debate reasons for why a situation is why it is, resorting to person insults of the sort posted is not acceptable.

Deleted on first read

Posted deleted due to it containing quote of post that had been moderated.

For the record have not yet seen the complaint that was raised with forum moderators apparently.

In reply to a post by Highland76:

Why do you repeatedly keep comparing energy suppliers to broadband suppliers on price comparison sites? You're comparing apples v oranges.

No I'm not. They are all utilities that cost money supplied to your home on which all the main price comparison websites list the providers supposedly closest to your own requirements and derive click thru income for doing so if you switch to them regardless of whether it is gas, electricity or broadband. It is therefore also perfectly reasonable to expect them to do this as accurately for broadband as for gas and electricity or for car or home insurance. We are of course talking about the same price comparison websites.

In case you're not aware, when you change energy suppliers nothing physically happens to the gas & electric coming in the pipes - purely who bills you changes. As a result, nearly all (if not all) energy suppliers are available nationwide. Unlike broadband which depends on which provider has installed their infrastructure in your area or exchange - which is a lot more more complex for price comparison websites to keep up to date with.

Yes I know perfectly well how the energy supply industry works. And actually there isn't much difference as for all ADSL2+, FTTC and FTTP services BT Openreach provides the final cable connection to your home (just as with gas and electricity) and that is only not true if you are with Virgin Media or are on the Hull exchange (not owned by BT Openreach). Of course the providers then have their own infrastructure either at the exchange or beyond to link with their national broadband networks and infrastructure but then that is little different in concept in pricing terms from the different energy suppliers having contracts to sell energy in the networks at wholesale level that then comes out as a blend of all suppliers in your home electricity cable or gas pipe.

Also what you are saying about all energy suppliers being available nationwide in all regions is factually untrue as quite a number of the smaller suppliers only operate in some electricity or gas areas that are either local to them or which are the largest areas in the country in terms of customer numbers.

As i said earlier, take your complaint to the price comparison websites. Having a public rant on TBB isn't going to fix anything.

I will take it to them too and to Ofcom and the Competition and Markets Authority and the Advertising Standarda Authority but there is no reason I should not be able to discuss it here amongst fibre broadband users. So what is your reason for trying to shut down the discussion. Do you perhaps have some reason why you don't like the workings of the price comparison websites to be subjected to public scrutiny and discussed with other users of these services who are also broadband customers?

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 14:38:56)

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

You say nothing has changed since 2016, which is incorrect we have made available our API at some point in 2018 it appeared.

Keeping API up to date is a 7 day a week job, so refute that nothing has happened.

I wasn't referring to ThinkBroadband's price and availability price comparison site as this is about the most complete and accurate in the UK, even though it doesn't include every single last tiny supplier (although does tend to include tiny suppliers who are very cheap or eager to promote themselves).

I was actually referring to the big boys in price comparison like Uswitch, GoCompare, Confused, CompareTheMarket and most disappointingly of all WhichSwitch, who don't seem to be getting any better or complete in the accuracy of the broadband price comparisons that they are undertaking. I am also even more disappointed that the smaller price comparison websites that Ofcom officially promotes and endorses don't seem to be any better. Its also interesting that none of the large sites are listed by Ofcom for whatever reasons.

I was actually hoping that you could persuade more of these inaccurate price comparison websites to use your broadband pricing information database because it seems to be about as good as it gets a the present time.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 14:42:14)

Yes I know perfectly well how the energy supply industry works. And actually there isn't much difference as for all ADSL2+, FTTC and FTTP services BT Openreach provides the final cable connection to your home (just as with gas and electricity) and that is only not true if you are with Virgin Media or are on the Hull exchange (not owned by BT Openreach). Of course the providers then have their own infrastructure either at the exchange or beyond to link with their national broadband networks and infrastructure but then that is little different in concept in pricing terms from the different energy suppliers having contracts to sell energy in the networks at wholesale level that then comes out as a blend of all suppliers in your home electricity cable or gas pipe.

Actually there is a big difference.

LLU ADSL2+ in places with BT Wholesale do not sell ADSL2+
The Openreach products that some providers do not sell
Product withdrawals in some areas that will affect things
The large range of alternate networks that exist, i.e. its a lot more than just Openreach and Virgin Media

So market is very different and that is before we start talking about how to display speed estimates to the public, such that with Ofcom rules even over the same Openreach infrastructure you can see different speeds from different suppliers.

Love to persuade but they know we exist and can ask and will get given quotes for cost of access.

In reply to a post by Capvermell:

I was actually hoping that you could persuade more of these inaccurate price comparison websites to use your broadband pricing information database because it seems to be about as good as it gets a the present time.

<sigh>
Why do you have trouble understanding that price comparison websites such uswitch are COMMERCIAL websites who are under no obligation to list any particular broadband provider? This is has been pointed out to you many times on this thread but you seem to have difficulty accepting this fact. You can rant & rave as much as you like but first & foremost, price comparison websites are interested in making money. Taking a Robin Hood approach means diddly squat to them, but good luck complaining to them...you'll need it.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

LLU ADSL2+ in places with BT Wholesale do not sell ADSL2+
The Openreach products that some providers do not sell
Product withdrawals in some areas that will affect things
The large range of alternate networks that exist, i.e. its a lot more than just Openreach and Virgin Media

So market is very different and that is before we start talking about how to display speed estimates to the public, such that with Ofcom rules even over the same Openreach infrastructure you can see different speeds from different suppliers.

Things like speed comparisons are also not constant over time or at different times of day, even with the same supplier so cannot be got exactly right but are only approximations and averages, but things like the physical availability of an FTTP supplier on your exchange is a fact and should be capable of being got right .

Also what is the excuse for all the price comparison websites claiming that TalkTalk G.Fast services are available on my exchange and phone number when G.Fast services are not and never have been available for any phone line on this exchange?

What I am concerned about is an apparent culture of saying that because broadband is somewhat more technically sophisticated that this makes it quite alright to have highly inaccurate, wrong and misleading data on most price comparison websites and especially in respect of FTTP and G.Fast

Also we are stuck with a situation with this ridiculous accountant led push for long contract lock-ins of up to 2 years with swingeing early termination penalties of as much as £1500 on the fastest services that is unhealthy for competition and consumers and so has much worse consequences if consumers are misled in to choosing the wrong broadband product with a 2 year contract lock in.

Ofcom have said suppliers must not charge more than their real costs if consumers terminate early but BT Retail in particular just ignores this and relies on only a small number of customers going to either Ofcom or the Small Claims Court or Trading Standards (if you can get the latter to take an interest which is very difficult) if they either have the energy to do so and/or enough money is at stake in terms of cancellation charges.

BT Openreach's whole model of pricing for turning on and off ADSL2+, FTTC or FTTP service at an address that already had any necessary install work done previously on faceplates and ONTs for another customer is quite wrong and cannot possibly be justified. All of it is deliberately anti competitive and clearly seeks to minimise the frequency with which customers can change suppliers.

The market in energy supply allows regular changes of supplier easily and monthly if you want without long lock ins (just as with 1 month contract mobile broadband SIM Only deals) but in the case of FTTC and FTTP it is impossible to avoid a lock in without big penalties of at least a year (and 2 years from the supplier which dominates the home broadband marketplace). But this is not acceptable and customers should be able to leave after 1 month if they pay any one off installation costs incurred and not recouped through a long contract. But this should not include all the monthly broadband line rental they hoped to earn over the next 24 months!!!!

In reply to a post by Highland76:

Why do you have trouble understanding that price comparison websites such uswitch are COMMERCIAL websites who are under no obligation to list any particular broadband provider? This is has been pointed out to you many times on this thread but you seem to have difficulty accepting this fact.

And why do you seem to have so much difficulty in accepting that proper competition and rational switching decisions by consumers will only happen if they have access to accurate price comparison data and are not subjected to ridiculously long contract lock ins of 2 years by the dominant fixed line operator that prevent consumers voting with their feet if they are treated badly by their current supplier.

I don't know what you do for a living exactly but I strongly get the impression that you don't seem to respect the right of customers to choose and change supplier if they are unhappy with the deal they are getting.

The point of regulators is to set rules and issues penalties for breaching them that deter dodgy and unethical switching sites from providing customers with wrong and misleading decisions that will cause them to make wrongly based decisions.

Of course I do get the strong impression that you appear to think any dodgy commercial tactic is possibly fair game in the name of businesses making money.

But I think we all saw where that failure to regulate and control things properly in the name of filthy lucre led in the sad case of Grenfell Tower.............

In reply to a post by Capvermell:

Do you perhaps have some reason why you don't like the workings of the price comparison websites to be subjected to public scrutiny

No one is trying to shut your conversation point down.

Several contributors have tried to give their opinions on why the comparison sites don't include FTTP but you appear to accuse them of bullying you because they ain't as outraged as you regarding this matter.

In reply to a post by dect:

Several contributors have tried to give their opinions on why the comparison sites don't include FTTP but you appear to accuse them of bullying you because they ain't as outraged as you regarding this matter.

Actually some of those posting told me I shouldn't be making these points here at all but should be lobbying my MP or making them at Speakers Corner.

I went to Speakers Corner as a child but other than a few obscure cranky religious sects I'm sure no one goes there now as all of these discussion that try to encourage the forming of opinions and political or legislative change have by and charge moved online to internet forms or the likes of Twitter and Facebook.

What I'm detecting here is a number of technical types who perhaps like driving their white vans to install stuff and do stuff but who possibly don't seem to understand about the importance of strong regulation in a marketplace to bring about fair competition and stop bad and misleading commercial practices.

I almost get the feeling that some contributors seem to regard consumers and/or consumer rights as almost being a nuisance and that anything is fair game in making money out of them in the name of commerce and filthy lucre. I can probably guess at the likely personal profile of contributors with these kinds of views and would strongly suspect that many of them are self employed and tend to drive white vans to their regular places of employment and hence the idea of regulation and legislation to bring about a healthy commercial marketplace or indeed even to ensure that self employed workers pay their taxes on all of their earnings rather than only 40 or 50% of them is something of an anathema to people of this kind.

Also what is the excuse for all the price comparison websites claiming that TalkTalk G.Fast services are available on my exchange and phone number when G.Fast services are not and never have been available for any phone line on this exchange?

What I am concerned about is an apparent culture of saying that because broadband is somewhat more technically sophisticated that this makes it quite alright to have highly inaccurate, wrong and misleading data on most price comparison websites and especially in respect of FTTP and G.Fast

...

But this should not include all the monthly broadband line rental they hoped to earn over the next 24 months!!!!

Without access to the different comparisons sites it is impossible to say why Gfast is showing up, they are doing things wrong or basing things on wrong input data, but you need to ask the individual sites as why they are doing what they are. Asking people here will at best have people saying don't know.

Not sure who is saying it is right for the sites to show incorrect data, people have been pointing out that the sites are commercial and the general ethos being that its in their own interests to get things right, since you won't sign up upon clicking through. Have you actually complained to the sites in question to see why they show the wrong things for you?

On the costs, ofcom has mandated changes they cannot charge the full cost of the remaining months of a term, there is a formula they should use that is based on the wholesale costs a provider will incur if you leave early. If you have evidence of BT Consumer not adhering to this then that needs reporting to Ofcom.

Also some providers do do 1 month contracts, not on Openreach FTTP yet as that has a 12 month minimum term from Openreach

As for Openreach pricing, I suggest you take that up with Ofcom who regulate and if they felt it was abusive would act.

In reply to a post by Capvermell:

strong impression that you

On a lighter note

I think you have smashed my TBB forum record of offending the most contributors in one day, I will send you the trophy in the post

Perhaps a more serious error is the Plusnet web site which states that at a particular address:

"Our line check shows that Fibre Broadband's not yet available in your area".

Which is not true. Fibre has been available from Gigaclear for the past 5 years, just not from Openreach.

The Uswitch shows average speeds for many suppliers which are completely unattainable at that address.

micjhael chare - this is symantics as you well know -- Plusnet are a BTW wholease and do not use Gigaclear) so that wont show that fibre is available (its the same as you ask for virgin media on the BT wholesale platform) -

or you going into sainsbury and asking for tescos own brand


muddying the waters as everything -

The fact that Openreach FTTP is available at an exchange does not necessarily mean it is available to more than a relatively small part of that exchange's coverage.

G.Fast is an even weirder setup as that is only available from a low percentage of the PCP (phone) cabinets that also have FTTC links. Even then G.Fast is only available within 100-200 metres or so (it would be great if anyone with greater knowledge than me could be more precise) of each such cabinet as beyond that it is slower than FTTC.

You referred earlier to ISPreview. Did you notice it provides a list of 200 ISPs? No doubt there are more. How many energy providers are there in the country? A dozen or so? I don't know.

Given that comparison websites rarely just deal with broadband, but with many different types of product, how feasible do you really think it is for them all to keep track of the detailed coverage and price and speed details of that many providers, most of which have many more package variants than energy suppliers do?

Bearing in mind that BT Group itself (BT, EE, Plusnet), Sky, TalkTalk, Vodafone and Virgin Mediashave something like 40,000,000 customers nationwide, with most of the Sports coverage being a monopoly product from one or they other. BT Sport and Sky Sport in particular, and VM being a one-pony-only supplier.

If you want people to engage in a reasonable debate with your, then the post this reply is after is a prime example of why you have got the responses you have.

In reply to a post by Capvermell:

What I'm detecting here is a number of technical types who perhaps like driving their white vans to install stuff and do stuff but who possibly don't seem to understand about the importance of strong regulation in a marketplace to bring about fair competition and stop bad and misleading commercial practices.

I almost get the feeling that some contributors seem to regard consumers and/or consumer rights as almost being a nuisance and that anything is fair game in making money out of them in the name of commerce and filthy lucre. I can probably guess at the likely personal profile of contributors with these kinds of views and would strongly suspect that many of them are self employed and tend to drive white vans to their regular places of employment and hence the idea of regulation and legislation to bring about a healthy commercial marketplace or indeed even to ensure that self employed workers pay their taxes on all of their earnings rather than only 40 or 50% of them is something of an anathema to people of this kind.

Chucking mud at the people who are trying to help you doesn't often work well. Particularly if you are trying to persuade them to change their view.

Also a pretty serious error is the one at www.bt.com/help/broadband/manage-service/thinking-of-leaving-bt- entitled at the top:-

"Thinking of Leaving BT"

That then goes on to say

"The cost of leaving

If you’re still in contract with us, bear in mind you’ll have to pay the remaining charges of contract to cancel early. Most of our contracts are 12 months, but we do have some that are 18 and 24 months.

This is a complete lie by BT Retail when All of their contracts that they actively market for broadband have a 24 month minimum contract, including even moving an old copper line from another ADSL2+ service to theirs (although you would have to be positively mad to do this).

The 24 month contract thing is a complete and total outrage by the dominant landline broadband provider just because so many middle class middle aged or older people wrongly have the impression that BT is the safest or best option when empirical evidence is they provide the very worst customer service and almost always badly screw up and misprocess almost any customer request or order.

What I can't for the life of me see is why we aren't all on the same page here about customers being locked in for far too long on fixed line broadband when 1 month contracts are the norm on SIM only data deals and there is also no equivalent of this all contracts are either 18 months or 2 years long with the big boys and 12 months with even the small broadband suppliers problem with gas or electricity supplies. Yes there are some contract of this length but they are the vast minority and contracts that let you leave on only the few weeks switching notice without any penalty are commonplace.

The telecoms regulator has completely and utterly failed us on on fixed line broadband competition as far as I am concerned but nobody seems to be able to do anything about it. Also totally ridiculous is that if you stay beyond the initial 18 or 24 month contract you then get punished with a higher price unless you accede to the commercial blackmail to be locked in for another 18 or 24 months.

Of course no doubt many of you here just love being locked in for 18 or 24 months broadband terms and I now await your conflicting posts (since there are clearly a large number people on this forum who just enjoy arguing and point scoring rather than just sharing information or forming a united front against telco exploitation) to tell me just why that is........................

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 15:37:20)

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

Chucking mud at the people who are trying to help you doesn't often work well. Particularly if you are trying to persuade them to change their view.

But the people in question aren't trying to help me at all. They are just trying to battle with me and goad me for its own sake because they are addicted to the process of forum conflict and debate (you will note the many thousands of forum posts many of them have, which in motivation terms goes way beyond wanting to help people). It is precisely because of people with this addictive forum posting personality type that I long ago stopped posting in most internet forums.

There have been helpful posts from people who agreed with me that there is inadequate and wrong information on broadband suppliers on FTTP exchanges and something needs to be done about this. But they made their helpful points and then moved on because they have other things to do in their day and their lives.

The people goading me are of course still here as it seems to be the main form of entertainment and enjoyment in their sunny spring Sunday weekend afternoon........

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-May-20 15:43:14)

Maybe we should all stop replying to you as you're clearly the aggressor.

In reply to a post by Capvermell:

What I can't for the life of me see is why we aren't all on the same page here about customers being locked in for far too long on fixed line broadband when 1 month contracts are the norm on SIM only data deals and there is also no equivalent of this all contracts are either 18 months or 2 years long with the big boys and 12 months with even the small broadband suppliers problem with gas or electricity supplies. Yes there are some contract of this length but they are the vast minority and contracts that let you leave on only the few weeks switching notice without any penalty are commonplace.

Sorry but thats utter rubbish. The best sim-only deals will be on 12+ months contract. Believe it or not, many people are fine with long contracts on broadband in exchange for rock bottom prices. If people want to be on 30 day rolling contracts then there are providers such as IDNet who offer monthly contracts (at least on FTTC) - but expect to pay more. You can't expect bargain basement prices on 30 day rolling contracts, its simple economics.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

If you want people to engage in a reasonable debate with your, then the post this reply is after is a prime example of why you have got the responses you have.

Actually that preceding post seems to have been totally removed by another forum moderator.

But no matter the people provoking the conflict don't actually have any constructive motive and do not want to help me or provide information but they so clearly enjoy the emotional conflict and the baiting itself, which gainsaying someone like me who they would broadly define as being "an over educated nonse" tends to give them.

Its precisely the same personality type that seeks to blockade the road in front of you and try and force you out of your vehicle for a punch up in retaliation for the most minor provocation in terms of responding to their aggressive driving or their deliberate invasion of your road space.

Surely in all the time you have been running web discussion forums you must have learned that this sort of personality type constitutes some of the most addicted and persistent and indeed most aggressive forum posters..............

I started, and shortly after, regretted, posting in this thread.

Maybe if we all stop replying, he’ll take his ill informed crusade elsewhere.

In reply to a post by Highland76:

Sorry but thats utter rubbish. The best sim-only deals will be on 12+ months contract. Believe it or not, many people are fine with long contracts on broadband in exchange for rock bottom prices.

If people want to be on 30 day rolling contracts then there are providers such as IDNet who offer monthly contracts (at least on FTTC) - but expect to pay more. You can't expect bargain basement prices on 30 day rolling contracts, its simple economics.

I had a 1 month contract with 6Gb of data and unlimited calls and texts with GiffGaff for £10 a month and when my ADSL modem broke it cost me only £10 more to upgrade to 80Gb of data at £20 a month. The supposedly unlimited data £25 plan is a con because if you exceed the 80Gb you get dropped to 384k speed and then can't buy another GoodyBag until the end of the month.

You can get slightly better value on SIM only by taking long contracts but it isn't worth it in relation to the penalties incurred if you want to leave because mobile coverage call reliability on their network suddenly gets worse (as it has here on O2 via GiffGaff during the lockdown).

Long contracts are generally of benefit to people who must have the latest Iphone every 2 years wrongly imaging they are getting it free on their £40 a month or may be more contract. However a 1 year contract on a SIM only deal may be ok if you are only paying £6 or £8 a month so the early termination penalties are very small. The early termination penalties on BT's Fibre 900 of over £1,500 in the early months out of a 24 month contract are not ok at all for anyone with any uncertainties about where they may be living in the future.

The thing is you clearly only want to see things in terms of what works for you as a man of probably great certainties and little analysis who probablyu doesn't value the freedom to be able to move suppliers if you are dissatisfied with the service you are getting.

In reply to a post by Zarjaz:

Maybe if we all stop replying

+1

In reply to a post by Zarjaz:

Maybe if we all stop replying, he’ll take his ill informed crusade elsewhere.

And a man with 9844 posts in a forum does not of course have any of the characteristics of a troll or a forum addict,

I think what you are saying is that you have realised I am a man who is not going to cave or give up in response to bullying posts from forum addicts trying to tell me what subjects I do or don't have the right to discuss here.

Basically its a kind of turf war thing where because I don't post here as much as someone like you that you then seem to consider I am not entitled to hold opinions on a subject that are at odds with your and so try to intimidate me out of my right to post on a subject related to broadband that I hold strong opinions on.

Forums of this kind are all machismo and posturing and notably mainly only inhabited by males with almost no female participation at all..........

Did you read closely this post of mine?

It possibly explains why some sites are giving you duff information, as pointed out by MrSaffron. In effect FTTP is not rolled out by exchange, and G.Fast even less so. The fact that an exchange has FTTP or G.Fast capability (though not necessarily on-site, but that's another story), is a prerequisite for FTTC/G.Fast/FTTP but not a guarantee for any particular address.

Note that the new BT Wholesale number/Address checker no longer even reports by Postcode alone. That's because a postcode can be handled by more than one cabinet which makes a mess of estimating any form of xDSL service.

Entering just the postcode into the Address option does however give a drop-down list of the addresses in that postcode from which the details for each can be obtained.

Note that for phone numbers it only works for those known to BT Wholesale. Not those of LLU suppliers.

The thinkbroadband Main Site has this short guide to the topology of FTTC and FTTP deployment. G.Fast basically requires FTTC to be already available at an address close to a cabinet. (AIUI there are a small number of exceptions to that).

Edit: Typo fix.

Edited by RobertoS (Mon 25-May-20 16:10:46)

In reply to a post by dect:

+1

I'm sure you can all find a new target in another thread who responds exactly as you expect and are hoping to being told what they are allowed to think or voice opinions on

There has been a degree of trolling from both sides.

As for ill informed, there is a point but it has got buried in a range of issues.

Accuracy of price comparison has been on DCMS/Ofcom radar for some time, but gone on back burner for various reasons in 2019 it seems. What the outcome will be is impossible to say but not hopeful of anything that is positive towards what I am doing.

Your response highlights exactly why people think you are trolling. If you did not respond like this then people might consider things differently.

What other forum moderator?

The post in question is still there at https://forums.thinkbroadband.com/fibre/t/4646187-re...

You are very much visibly on the offensive against other posters now.

If people want to debate then debate is fine, but that also means people may not neccesarily agree with everything you post, or may ask things like why?

That does not mean they are attacking you, but simply debating.

The issue around comparison sites and accuracy of checkers has been circulated around DCMS/Ofcom so while nothing much is visible there may be changes, but not in the short term. Though it is not clear what Ofcom/DCMS will actually impose on the industry as some of the proposals are such that only the largest 3 or 4 sites would be able to survive under what has been proposed in the post.

For our part we do the best that we can and believe am well ahead of the curve in terms of helping people find the best service in their particular location.

The broadband API that we use and coverage info on sites like https://labs.thinkbroadband.com/local/postcode-search is available under commercial terms, we'd love to do lots of things for free but there are salaries and costs involved in running this sort of thing.

The thread did cover a whole wide range of things, but they were ultimately distractions to what should have been the single issue.