FTTP in parts of new(ish) development, but not others?

Hi all,

Appreciate there are a fair few of these threads on the forums but there were some great insights in those that I'd love to hear about my situation.

I live in a development built approximately 10 years by a single property developer. I'm currently with Virgin Media with FTTP internet but am now looking to shop around now my contract is almost up. Putting my address into the BT wholsale checker shows that FTTP is not available at my house (https://imgur.com/6KEq64T). However, just across the road and many others in the same estate show as having FTTP available (https://imgur.com/2u9KOpS). This other house is just across the same road, approximately 4 metres from my front door. Additionally on the same side of the road there is a house one door down which also shows as FTTP available which I would have though must have the same buried conduit as I'm on?

Additionally I filled out the OpenReach form about neighbours having access to FTTP. They reply as follows:

"
We've checked our records and you are correct that FTTP(Fibre to the Premises) infrastructure were constructed in your area but there is no fully completed FTTP infrastructure close enough to your address through which FTTP can be made available.

Further the neighbours who are getting FTTP might be connected to different route or infrastructure you can't get service from the same route or infrastructure due to engineering restrictions
"

I suppose this could be the case but it doesn't make that much sense to me given they already came down my road (an offshoot to the main estate road) so it would seem really odd that they'd miss many houses in a place where there aren't very many houses anyway (development is ~140 houses).

I'd really love to not be stuck on Virgin Media for good internet speeds as they're going to hike my rates fairly soon. Would any of you be able to offer much insight into why this is the case?

Is "a house one door down" your next door neighbour?
It's interesting [and no doubt galling] that the house with FTTP available shows drastically higher speeds for DSL. This suggests that quite different routes are being taken. But to be honest, all I am doing here is paraphrasing what Openreach have told you.
Given that there are finite limits to everything, there has to be a point at which something is possible, and beyond that, it is not. Your property may not be within the "policy distance" of the CBT, whereas your neighbours are. Do you know where the CBTs are?

Are you connected to the same exchange and cabinet as your next door neighbour who can get FTTP?

In reply to a post by dect:

Are you connected to the same exchange and cabinet as your next door neighbour who can get FTTP?

Look at the quoted ADSL speeds, if they were on the same exchange/route then you'd expect those to be much the same, however they are very different.

Granted there could be a reason for this, such as poor wiring in a customers house has caused a fault and the real world figures have been updated etc. Without knowing what exchange and cab the two properties are on it's impossible to say.

Not much consolation to the OP, but the route for FTTP can be radically different to FTTC/Copper. In my case my FTTP came from the opposite direction and I am now at the 'end of the line'

In reply to a post by TheInstaller:

Granted there could be a reason for this, such as poor wiring in a customers house has caused a fault and the real world figures have been updated etc. Without knowing what exchange and cab the two properties are on it's impossible to say.

also we don't know what the nearest property has fttp either. Not sure if its close enough for a couple of the op's neighbours and the op to use gigabit vouchers.

Thanks for the responses.

I'll post a picture of a layout of the estate to clear a few things up but indeed the entire estate is served by the same exchange. I don't know where the cabinets are as I believe they're all buried.

In regards to which neighbours have FTTP. Immediately across the road two detached houses have it available. The nearest is approx 5 metres across the road door to door. I live in a semi detached property, the attached home also doesn't have FTTP available, however the detached property next to ours, on the same side of the road, does have FTTP available. The diagram should help, I'll post that shortly.

the btwholesale checker shows which exchange and cab your are served by

Have you checked if your eligible for gigabit vouchers https://gigabitvoucher.culture.gov.uk/

Think he's on Virgin Media RFoG already so not eligible for vouchers.

Diagram of the estate is here: https://imgur.com/Vpjw1PD
Green has FTTP available, red is not - blue is my house.

Ah yes it does. All served by cabinet one, no difference between FTTP available houses and not.

Indeed not eligible for gigabit vouchers because I have Virgin media fibre available. So obviously no exactly the biggest problem but more interested to understand why Openreach have served the houses they have but no others.

There is an interesting correlation between if the ADSL speeds are particularly poor and if FTTP is available. In the pictures in the original post for example - houses which have FTTP available also have better ADSL speed.

Edited by banterboo22 (Fri 12-May-23 14:49:30)

In reply to a post by XGS_Is_On:

Think he's on Virgin Media RFoG already so not eligible for vouchers.

sorry my bad i didn't fully consume banterboo22's post

In reply to a post by banterboo22:

Diagram of the estate is here: https://imgur.com/Vpjw1PD
Green has FTTP available, red is not - blue is my house.

This shows you're in the middle of the red area, just like the other red houses.

Every FTTP rollout has to end somewhere, and unfortunately that means there's always somebody just past the boundary.

At some point, they'll come back to fill in - at least, when they start looking at what needs to be done to close down your local copper exchange.

You would have been a good fit for the FTTPoD near network trial, but that finished a year ago.

This is perhaps as I feared, but appreciate you taking a look.

I won't lie I think it seems backwards that they would do an estate like this without including all the houses (especially given all the ducting would already have been in place) but I can't really be too mad as I do still have VM gigabit available.

Not that long ago OR FTTP wasn’t the default option on new sites , developers could chose FTTP , but it wasn’t compulsory and the OR copper pair option probably made more financial sense for the developer , with copper pairs , OR actually paying the developer ££ per plot , or the developer having to pay a contribution towards OR FTTP if they went for that.
OR’s policy towards FTTP on newsites has changed over the years , it’s now effectively ‘free’ ( no cost to the developer) for OR FTTP on sites of 19 plots or more and rebates and a set maximum contribution cost for sites with between 11-19 plots, previously 30 plots the point at which the developer didn’t have to contribute.

Significant size housing developments are normally completed in phases , these can stretch out over several years , so the prevailing OR FTTP policy could have been different on ( for example) phase 1 to phase 2 , so although it may seem odd to the householder , it’s not really difficult to see how you can get housing developments with very near neighbours, where some are on copper pairs and some have FTTP , they may be physically close to each other , but will have constructed in different phases of the overall development.
Eventually OR will get around to retro fitting FTTP .

Edited by Iniltous (Fri 12-May-23 18:02:45)

My money is on duct problems.

candlerb is pretty much on the money regarding this. But i will add this to his comments. They may have done some of your estate to test the waters compared to vm's offering. So if it goes well they may come back and finish it it off sooner than later

That would be ideal, certainly what I'm hoping for.

Duct problems might make some sense I suppose, but as far as I can tell VM is using the same ducts with no problems so not sure.

the green buildings before the river looks like one splitter node. I don't understand why theres only 5 properties past the river, it may be the same project or something else.

It does look like its partially done.

What does https://www.openreach.com/ and what does https://www.openreach.com/fibre-broadband/where-when... say for your exchange.

We can't crystal ball OR's intentions they have a costing spreadsheet and if your area goes over it - its nada for now. Harsh but its OR's money. With project gigabit, every single premise in the uk will be mapped for cost and which has access to Gigabit capable connections. So OR will have a better model then they did prior to this.