Bowdon.

Re your last para, It was not BT but OFCOM ( and other operators) that inhibited the rollout of Fibre.

Years ago BT ran Fibre to the close for TPON but was forced to overlay all of it with Copper so that other operators could unbundle it. Much of this was a long way from the exchange so ADSL performance was horrible, see Cambourne near Cambridge as an example. BT was eventually allowed to have ONE trial area, the new town Ebbsfleet, that was FTTP only but the crash of 2008 led to a very limited build. Then another long argument to get a small village in the Midlands as a trial to replace copper with FTTP (Deddington), it had to be an area with NO unbundling so no to interfere with any other operator. It is only the last ~5 years that OFCOM have allowed BT to provide FTTP only new builds and even then there was lots of argument ( sorry debate) before they would agree as other operators presented the case that they would be locked out of the area as they didn't support FTTP.

You need to put the blame squarely on the cause and it was not BT

( Knowledge gleaned from .planning TPON in the 1990s and ITT for FTTP circa 2004.)

Even in Deddington there are some people who refused to move to FTTP even when it was exactly the same price and still take ADSL products. Just look at the speed test results.

I did my FTTP buddying in Deddington ....

not sure why you call it the Midlands, that�s South of Banbury. Otherwise, I wholeheartedly agree with your post kitcat.

Part of the old South Midlands area!

In reply to a post by MCM:

Why then are so many on FTTP buying the lowest speed package not just in the UK but also for example Australia? Most likely because they see no need for more or they wish to minimise their costs. Likewise with FTTC and VM cable where many opt for the lowest speed option despite being able to get higher speeds. Of course FTTP allows users to move to higher speeds when their use requires these whereas FTTC is limited. However my comments have nothing to do with whether we should go for 100% FTTP but rather what customers are prepared to pay for today.

I was really making a general post, though I did reply to your points only so my bad.

I'm not planning on buying the highest tier service if I ever get FTTP. It'll probably come down to price per month for me. But though I have FTTC now, I am eager to move to FTTP because I might get closer to the speeds I'm paying for. I think FTTP overall is better value for money for the end user.

I think when it comes to FTTC speeds we can't really say for sure based solely on what packages people buy as why they chose that package. If a 95% of a town opted for the upto 40MB package then based on that we know that 95% bought the upto 40MB package. But we don't know why. The copper lines in that area might all be of poor quality and 95% of them might not be able to get above 55MB. So in that situation all FTTC packages would be available to them, but it wouldn't be worth buying the higher tier for 10 to 15MB's extra, if they even get that. So unless a decent amount of people are polled and asked indepth questions of why they didn't choose the higher package then its an assumption.

In reply to a post by kitcat:

You need to put the blame squarely on the cause and it was not BT.

I wasn't blaming the whole of BT/OR. I was just passing on the comments said to me by 3 OR engineer people. But I get your point. I agree that a lot of the blame for holding up broadband roll out lies at the feet of Ofcom and also some councils. I think Ofcom have become a quango. I think it would make a more powerful case if the head actually knew what they were talking about when it comes to fibre broadband.

I went a little off-topic I think.. so I'll ask a FoD question.. the more regular FTTP gets laid down, do we expect that FoD prices would reduce too, or would it still require the same amount of work to be done?

In reply to a post by bowdon:

I think when it comes to FTTC speeds we can't really say for sure based solely on what packages people buy as why they chose that package

I think the best way to gauge speeds people may get is to look at what speeds people go for now with FTTP.

Hyperoptic offer three tiers of FTTP - 30meg, 150meg and 1Gig.

The 30meg is the equivalent speeds of the regular FTTC and if people were satisfied with those speeds would go for the same with FTTP. I get the feeling however by far the most popular will be the 150meg as its the best mix of speed and price.

I have no idea what the spread might be across either Hyperoptic or VM's various offering however in Australia, and yes I appreciate a different country, fibre customers buy the slower speeds.

"NBN take-up figures show houses connected via the ALP�s gold-plated fibre-to-the-premises connections are in fact 25 per cent more likely to buy the cheapest and slowest internet package than those households with fibre-to-the-node connections, which include some copper wiring but cost taxpayers half as much to install."

Source NBN paradox: fibre-to-home customers buy slowest speeds. The Australian 23 Nov 2017
FTTP
37.7% 12Mbps down 1Mbps up
46.4% 25Mbps down 5Mbps up
3.3% 50Mbps down, 20Mbps up
12.6% 100Mbps down, 40Mbps up

Fibre to the Node, similar I think to our FTTC, and Hybrid fibre coaxial similarly show most customer opting for 25Mbps down & 5Mbps up.

https://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/8010-what-broadb...

Has UK relative popularity based on what we see from speed tests

Thank you Andrew, I should have looked harder as I knew you had covered the subject.

So taking BT Consumer FTTP it would seem the split is roughly
42.5% Up to 52Mbps
35% Up to 76Mbps
22.5% > 76Mbps
although I suspect a rather small sample all of these should expect to see the full 76Mps or better if they were to chose that package.
Ignoring FTTC where distance is a limiting factor we have VM with
19.5% up to 50Mbps
61.4% up to 100Mbps
16.4% up to 200Mbps
2.7% up to 350Mbps
Here again most if not all should be able to get the highest speeds however the majority appear to be opting for one of VM's various up to 100Mbps products.

It would appear that the majority of these customer have opted for a mid range option with only a limited number choosing the fastest. Naturally over time I would expect people to opt for faster packages where available but for now many are content to stick with lower speeds such the 32.3% of BT customers still using ADSL despite many being able to get faster speeds via FTTC if they were to choose to do so. Vodafone being the ISP bucking this trend, no doubt due to their aggressive pricing for FTTC.

It's been interesting to see this thread evolve. I got a quote last year which came in at around £3500 + £165 for 3 years from Cerberus which I thought was quite reasonable. As self employed contractor, I thought it was best to hold off until my contract was renewed which unfortunately fell after the change in Costing.

If was to get a requote, am I now looking at 30k+ for the install? I'd be happy to follow through and get a full survey but in my mind an increase of 20k total ownership from prior would seem hard to justify regardless of the 1st year capital allowances and other accounting I could do.

Those are interesting stats!

I gotta say, I find it a bit ironic that we're debating on people not wanting to pay for faster speeds on a thread were people are prepared to pay for faster speeds! lol.

I wish OR or ISP's would create a form that people can register interest in FTTP. They could also add any requests for FoD in to the mix too. Then they would know which areas they are more likely to get potential higher tier customers from.