Openreach Ultrafast

Like a lot of people on these hallowed forums, I usually post here when I'm unhappy about being missed or passed over for the latest developments in internet access by BT / Openreach / Virgin.

A few weeks back an elderly neighbour of mine mentioned that he had seen an Openreach van in our street and the engineer was 'painting marks' on the footpath. My neighbour politely enquired with the engineer about his visit and was told it was a survey for 'Fibre Internet' or words to that effect. As we are usually at the a**e end of everything here I thought nothing more of it. I didn't even bother to use the BT Wholesale checker that at one time I was obsessed with and frequently disappointed by.

Last Tuesday our street was full of Openreach vans, I counted 7 at one point. Streetworks said it was a 'blocked duct'. Again, I didn't even bother to use the BT Wholesale checker.

Last Friday, in a Teams meeting, a colleague who lives in a village 10 miles away was telling us all about his fibre install. He had opted for the 150 Mb package. Obviously my colleague being able to get FTTP was not an indication that I could, but I made a mental note to check the Openreach / BT Checker at some point.

On Saturday evening I remembered to check, just before I went to bed. It took me a minute to spot the "FTTP is available and a new ONT may be ordered". OMG!

Sunday (3rd) lunch time was spent debating which option / supplier etc. Settled on BT as I'm currently with PlusNet so no cancellation fee if arranged through PN. 40 Minute call later and it's all organised for April 19th, with survey due 6th April.

This morning (5th) and an Openreach engineer arrives. He talks me through a couple of options and for the easiest one he needs to dig a hole. I say yes and after a couple of hours I now have a coiled up fibre under my living room window ready to go on the 19th.

I can't quite believe how quickly this has all happened. Who knew BT / Openreach could be so 'Ultrafast'. I know I'm probably going to regret posting this if the appointment on the 19th doesn't go well.

Wish me luck anyway!

Del

At least you got OR engineers to do the job. My neighbour opposite had ftth installed yesterday and it took three different Quinn contractors to do the job including one in a cherry picker connecting the fibre to the cbt at the top of the shared power/bt pole on his own. I asked him where his safety assistant was and he wouldnt answer !!!. It would also be nice if the Quinn staff had been trained to use a spirit level when fitting the splice point box!

As the CBT was accessed via a hoist, then the installer was the hoists safety bod

The engineer that came today was a bit older and seemed very experienced. He even said he still enjoyed doing this kind of 'civils' work.

Top bloke he was too. I guess they can't all be the same, especially the contractors.

Del.

Sounds good, can you explain why he needed to dig a hole? Just trying to get it straight in my head

My install required a hole dug also, due to a partially DiG feed.

They dug a hole in my garden where the line exited the partial duct, fed the fibre up the duct to the hole then used a microduct across the garden to the property.

Edited by BuckleZ (Wed 06-Apr-22 15:13:23)

In reply to a post by BuckleZ:

My install required a hole dug also, due to a partially DiG feed.

They dug a hole in my garden where the line exited the partial duct, fed the fibre up the duct to the hole then used a microduct across the garden to the property.

Thanks for explaining what happened in your case its much appreciated.

Same circumstances for me too.

Who knew BT / Openreach could be so 'Ultrafast'
…
Wish me luck anyway!

It may not seem so to many folks, but Openreach are actually increasing the speed and efficiency which they are building out their network. As they have to really to meet the aggressive build targets they have set and to keep out in front of the increasing competition.

👍 …should be on the home straight now.

In reply to a post by Zarjaz:

As the CBT was accessed via a hoist, then the installer was the hoists safety bod

but the guy with the cherry picker was on his own when he used the hoist to connect the cable to the cbt, then later in the day another guy turned up and fastened the cable to the bargeboard and ran the cable down the wall (badly)to the splice point which he didnt get level

OK, you hadn’t made that clear, well not to me anyway,

So someone does appear to have flouted safety rules. That ain’t good. You pay peanuts, you get monkeys, if you pay per job, then you get corner cutting cowboys.

to update on this job especially for zarjaz. a quinn area manager came out to inspect the job that i mentioned above, and it transpired that the cable from pole to house was too low so quinns had to come back and redo it properly with TWO people and a cherry picker. they had to connect to the cbt at the top of the pole in my garden run the fibre to the next pole and then come back towards the house to connect to a higher point on the top of the gable (mind you they still fixed the fibre to the wooden barge board rather than the nice strong brickwork!)

Well at least their bosses now know about the chancer who first visited.

I suspect your case is just the tip of the iceberg though.

In reply to a post by delone:

I can't quite believe how quickly this has all happened. Who knew BT / Openreach could be so 'Ultrafast'. I know I'm probably going to regret posting this if the appointment on the 19th doesn't go well.

Wish me luck anyway!

Del

Since I got VDSL over the years my speed dropped from 80Mb/s to about 40Mb/s, part of my town has fibre from a non-Openreach provider but they missed me out(Openreach will lay fibre in the same town from 2022 onwards). Thought I'd also never get an ultrafast connection, but for some weird reason I'm in a Three 5G area so I gave their mobile broadband a test knowing I could send it back in 14 days. I now get a consistent 350Mb/90Mb(sometimes going up to 500Mb down) for £21/month. After waiting so long for fibre, I now don't need it ...

Quick update... Contractor came yesterday morning at exactly 8AM and left at 8:42AM with everything up and running.

Wired speed only averaging around 500Mb so far. I hope it will increase. That said, I need some new internal cabling due to change in location of router but not a big deal. WiFi is fine for now around the 350Mb mark.

Del

In reply to a post by delone:

Settled on BT as I'm currently with PlusNet so no cancellation fee if arranged through PN.

Can you explain how this works to help others wanting to go down the same avenue.

In reply to a post by delone:

Wired speed only averaging around 500Mb so far. I hope it will increase.

Might have missed it, but what ISP and what bandwidth/speed package was ordered?

Note FTTP doesn't train / learn / stabilise / increase or decrease after installation etc. or otherwise like copper based products. It is what it is, from the get go. Always test directly from the ONT port if possible for greatest accuracy.

Your test device may not be capable of pushing more than 500Mb through a speed test - others have seen the same issues with Windows/network adapters/drivers.

Yeah sure.

Plusnet, BT and EE are all part of the same group of companies.

Plusnet do not currently offer any FTTP products (although this should change in a few months). If you want to move to an FTTP product they will allow you to move away to either BT or EE based FTTP based connections without any early termination charges.

If you call customer services and follow the "Leaving Plusnet" prompts the CS agent can take your order for your preferred.

I chose BT (without checking the EE offers) and the Plusnet agent put the order through for me and it all went really smoothly and quick.

Del

BT 900 / 110

Getting max throughput now on both. A nice new Cat 6 cable sorted out the earlier issue.

Del