Incoming fibre box - commercial premises

I have just taken over a commercial premises with this box in the services cupboard. My guess is that it's infrastructure for a leased line:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/8u5b5itx3jjevaw/Fibre%20Bo...

Can anyone give me any general information on it?

And to reinstate it, am I correct that the only way is to contract with a leased line provider? (I.e. no FTTP or similar products are available to it). Openreach says that copper broadband is the only product available on the street

It's a fibre joint - the black and yellow cable is the external cable and the white ones are internal. They'll probably terminate in a panel somewhere, which may or may not have LTE attached.

Of course, the previous occupant may have removed that.

It can be used for any fibre-terminated service (usually a leased line) but not for a PON/FTTP.

Looks like there are already two white shotgun blown fibre tube connections running from that joint box. So it likely serves (or did at one time) two different connections. Judging by the state of them one is more recent than the original.

If you decide to take this up with a leased line provider, they should be able to see from their ordering portals that the premises already has Openreach 'tails' present so this would speed up delivery potentially (and also means no potential for ECC charges).

The handwritten lettering gives the location of where the tails run to; the local exchange code and the nearest T-node it is spliced through.

Good luck.

Correct, that's for a leased line and cannot be used for FTTP.

Very true.

Can go the other way however if needing an EAD hanging off 'FTTP' infra. where there's no other fibre around. Just not via the typical CBT and drop though.

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

If you decide to take this up with a leased line provider, they should be able to see from their ordering portals that the premises already has Openreach 'tails' present so this would speed up delivery potentially (and also means no potential for ECC charges).

It still comes with a roughly £2K connection charge from Openreach to activate the circuit, even if fibre is already present.

However, if you take a 36 month contract then typically there is no up-front payment because the reseller buries it in the monthly rental.

Some providers have a "deferred" installation option, which means that you can take an initial 12 month contract but the connection charge is not paid up front. If you don't renew after 12 months then you pay the deferred charge, and if you don't renew after 24 months you pay (e.g.) half the deferred charge, but if you renew to 36 months the charge is wiped.

Yep with the 36-month agreements they'll typically 'fund' up to and including £3K-ish worth of ECCs and 'lose' any connection charges.

Obv. commercially they have less room to manoeuvre on 12-month contracts. So ECCs could expected to be front loaded and connection costs etc.

Thanks all.

I do believe it has Openreach 'tails' but candlerb's explanation of the £2k activation charge explains why I am seeing no savings off generic published leased line rates, which I knew have some ECC charges absorbed into them.

I was hoping for a better leased line deal (in price or length of contract) given the infrastructure is all in place.

OR the ability to take advantage of some nicer priced FTTP (etc) packages - but again seems that's not an option.

Better get my wallet out!

Have you had final (not estimated) quotes from various providers or are you relying on the likes of linebroker.co.uk ?

That is a DCB ( dual circuit box ) and something of an old fashioned but still used and usable part of the OR Ethernet network, rather than BFT ( blown fibre tubing ) the two white ‘cables’ exiting the DCB are likely to be COF8002 , a two fibre cable that can be used on internal runs , chances are this DCB is simply where the external cable enters the building , another one or two splice splice points will have existed , and may still exist, no doubt where the comms room for the building was ( or possibly where the two comms rooms were, given that there are two COF 8002’s,) the other possibility is that the previous occupant had more than two circuits and the first two leased lines exhausted the first cable , but often in cases like this , those cables will be cut and effectively now useless, although the feed into the building ( the black and yellow cable ) probably is still connected to a ‘Node’ , TYUFW being the T code.

As far as pricing , when speaking to a ‘seller’ , mention of this existing kit may help, but as stated it’s also my understanding that the first couple of £K of construction costs are included anyway…but obviously don’t expect to be paying residential FTTP prices with a business grade fibre leased line.

Edited by Iniltous (Fri 16-Dec-22 17:24:51)

You're right it is COF rather than BFT shotgun which about twice the size. My mistake.

Just had a new one installed today as it happens with Commscope COF8002 going to the fibre shelf. DCB photo here.

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

Just had a new one installed today as it happens with Commscope COF8002 going to the fibre shelf. DCB photo here.

See how long it takes for those to appear on other forums and comments sections.

I was thinking that when I posted..😂 For those with access its pretty easy to geolocate anyhow.

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

Just had a new one installed today as it happens with Commscope COF8002 going to the fibre shelf. DCB photo here.

Yaay!

They got there on the 5th attempt - well that is they actually turned up today with four previously missed scheduled days! Oh and one unannounced, out of the blue visit where they managed to chuck the fibre over the hedge. They did at least leave it coiled up, bless them 🙈

Yes Openreach if you're reading - your patch for the Ethernet guys is just a tad too stretched in Suffolk.

Saying that however, the chaps today couldn't have been more helpful and courteous. Five stars there.

Still not active though, will take a few days at least for them to liven it up and then flunk about getting VLANs etc sorted with carrier.

In reply to a post by rgs500:

Thanks all.

I do believe it has Openreach 'tails' but candlerb's explanation of the £2k activation charge explains why I am seeing no savings off generic published leased line rates, which I knew have some ECC charges absorbed into them.

I was hoping for a better leased line deal (in price or length of contract) given the infrastructure is all in place.

OR the ability to take advantage of some nicer priced FTTP (etc) packages - but again seems that's not an option.

Better get my wallet out!

If there is already fibre there, there won't be any ECCs as it should be pretty much ready to go - any competent ISP can get you fired up with ethernet - and the odds of any sane ISP charging much if anything for setup/install is near zero in that scenario.

Pretty much any business contract is a 3 year one - and that removes those costs generally too - a 1 year contract is likely as expensive if not more than 3 years... or certainly a lot closer.

In reply to a post by therioman:

Pretty much any business contract is a 3 year one - and that removes those costs generally too - a 1 year contract is likely as expensive if not more than 3 years... or certainly a lot closer.

That blanket statement is not always true.

To give you an example, I was offered the following for a 1G leased line in central London: £330 per month on a 12 month contract plus £1112 deferred installation fee (halved at 24 months and waived at 36).

The setup fee amounts to less than 4 months service charge, so it's still *way* cheaper than 36 months if we had to break out at 12 or 24. For a 36-month fixed contract, the monthly fee would only have been a few quid a month less.

Anyway: this is just to show that you need to research the market to find a leased line service that meets your needs, with terms you are happy with.

One thing to beware of though: often the terms are 12-monthly auto-renewal, and you have to give notice 90 days *before* the end of the current term to prevent renewal. This is designed to catch you out: so put it in your calendar to search for alternative offers (and/or talk to your account manager) at least 120 days before the end of the term.

In reply to a post by therioman:

That blanket statement is not always true.

I guess you missed "pretty much" - not a blanket statement.

I'm well aware of how it works - and there are always exceptions to the rule - but often the agreements will work out far more in the favour of a longer term - and especially so if you want a managed router (I generally recommend against that).

But if you end up in ECCs etc (unlikely or OP given it's already there) it's almost certainly cheaper for a 3 year.

Also, London is rarely a good measure of "normal"

In reply to a post by therioman:

If there is already fibre there, there won't be any ECCs as it should be pretty much ready to go - any competent ISP can get you fired up with ethernet - and the odds of any sane ISP charging much if anything for setup/install is near zero in that scenario.

EAD installation charges from Openreach are £1900+VAT regardless of what infrastructure already exists, and they go up from there if the ECCs are above a £3k-ish number.

In reply to a post by jpm:

In reply to a post by therioman:

If there is already fibre there, there won't be any ECCs as it should be pretty much ready to go - any competent ISP can get you fired up with ethernet - and the odds of any sane ISP charging much if anything for setup/install is near zero in that scenario.

EAD installation charges from Openreach are £1900+VAT regardless of what infrastructure already exists, and they go up from there if the ECCs are above a £3k-ish number.

Yes, I'm well aware of how Openreach charge, I sell Ethernet.

But that is not relevant.

The point is, the odds of ECCs which was discussed is practically zero in this scenario, and what the OP may or may not be quoted for installation has no bearing on what OR charge - it might be the ISP charges less for install and more for monthly or vice versa, and the point remains in most common scenarios, a 3 year agreement is the best value way to get onto the Ethernet ladder.

I agree.

We appeared to have strayed onto a tangental here and arguing the toss about OR (or other physical service provider) connection costs which are directly related to the "overall revenue opportunity" a provider is basing their offering on.

This in itself is a fairly linear relationship with contract duration. If the revenue is £5K they obv. wont swallow the connection costs in the same way as if the revenue opportunity was say £15K. Similarly for ECCs where the "pot" is open for longer duration contracts, but you would be expected to have it front loaded on a 12 month term. Simple commercial reality

For the OP considering this....

1. There should be no ECC possibility. The fibre is sitting there.
2. There could be a reduced provisioning time benefit.

My most recent experience with EAD in that respect has been shall we say tarnished, through poor post survey and internal communications within Openreach. A service that could have gone live several months ago didn't for various reasons.

As a customer, my experience previously with Openreach EAD is that they can be incentivised to physically provision new circuits (area dependent / T-node dependant) in weeks rather than months if the right folks are calling the shots and making it happen.

Changes to Openreach Ethernet connection costs In the news today over at ISPreview:

https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2022/12/openre...

Was inevitable really