Latest 15:00 update today:

26/01/2017 13:01 - Port down, engineers onsite working on fibre cable issue.

So looks like should be fixed quite soon, hopefully!

Thanks a lot for your updates, AndyHCZ - they were spot on.

My friend got info via a neighbor's facebook account late this morning that BT were nearby in force and that the engineer had told them a fibre break 4.5km from the exchange had been found and was being worked on.

He got home a little earlier and his connection is back once again!

Seems it really was just a case of someone with an OTDR being available to find the break and once that was done it was a relatively quick fix!