Working our way through new postcodes after a big update, and probably another coming in a month or two and a lot are seeing FTTC or FTTP available, i.e. the policy changes http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/7345-improved-dea... may be bearing more fruit.

That said in previous years we have seen new build benefit, but the proportion does seem to be higher now (and am referring to London area too)

Of course while a shift to cab 4 looks likely, until someone is live you can never be sure.

The FTTC estimation requires that Openreach has a knowledge of the loss (in dB) between the cabinet and the DP, as well as knowing what cabinet the DP is connected to.

In your case, I would guess that a new DP has been installed in the block as part of the conversion, and the records have been updated to show these new addresses as being routed via the cabinet that the DP is connected to.

However, if the records don't hold a figure for the loss between the cabinet and the DP, the estimation appears to default back to a "line too long" result.

We've certainly seen cases where this has happened, and the line eventually gets a proper estimate. I don't think we've seen a case where Openreach say "whoops. you are EO after all" instead - though it does sometimes take some stubborness to overcome laziness at the ISP, BTW or Openreach.

My guess would be that you are indeed now routed via the cabinet, but need Openreach to update some database before you can order. But the chance that it remains EO is not yet zero, unfortunately.

In reply to a post by WWWombat:

My guess would be that you are indeed now routed via the cabinet, but need Openreach to update some database before you can order. But the chance that it remains EO is not yet zero, unfortunately.

Hopefully things will become clearer once I am able to get the phone line activated/connected, especially if that triggers databases to be updated.

Yes - that is probably one way for things to become clearer. It usually takes 24-48 hours for the database changes to reflect into the estimates.

So is a good plan (if I am going with BT):

1. Get BT line installed
2. Once done check what broadband product I can get assuming the databases have updated now that there is an active phone line.
3. Order FTTC product if possible (BT Infinity in this case).

Does following this plan mean I will lose out on all the new customer offers, as since I would have signed a 12 month contract with BT for the phone I am no longer 'new' ?

Alternatively I can sign up on an ADSL 'bundle' but can this be then converted to FTTC if it turns out I can get it?

Oooph - i think others will have to add opinions on how to best do this WRT keeping decent offers in place.

How close to moving in are you? Will others have started to occupy the block before you? If so, their orders might be enough to trigger enough of an update to the database.

I am a couple of weeks away. But I think I will be one of the first to move in. I think I might just go ahead and get the phone line ordered in order to get things moving.
Hopefully I could negotiate some kind of offer to add on ADSL/FTTC once I know the status of the line.

I ordered a BT phone line (on its own) a few days ago with an installation date of 14 September and requires an engineer visit to connect up to the internal DP.

However, today bt wholesale and other checkers said I can order FTTC (based on address search as I don't have a connected phone line yet).

While this is great news, I don't know what to do about my existing order. Do I:

1) Cancel and order new phone+FTTC together (asking for simultaneous provide)
2) Wait for phone order to complete and then order FTTC

I was thinking 1) would mean I get FTTC sooner but then I read simultaneous provides can go wrong and have longer lead times. So maybe 2) is best?

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

I'd wait till the line is active then order FTTC.

Go for the order, since the FTTC will most likely be a cab only task, they will just bundle the job together with that for the install .... I did two of these yesterday