FTTP: no ducts

Hi folks!

My parents have a problem. They live at the end of a cul-de-sac. At the start of the cul-de-sac there are ducts, but towards the end the phone lines are directly buried, meaning that most of the homes have access to FTTP but around 12 homes at the end of the cul-de-sac (including my parents) do not.

I initially contacted Openreach through their fibre enquiries form and they seem to be aware that there are no ducts, but they don't seem to have any plan to fix this. In my mind there are only ever going to be two fixes -- either excavate the pavement to install ducts, or install a pole or two... Is there any way to "encourage" Openreach to pull their finger out and (preferably) install ducting or (if unavoidable) install a couple of poles?

TIA

Have they tried to order FTTP. If you are able to order, Openreach are prepared to duct the fibre to you. That appears to be the policy in my Direct In Ground area - no order no duct work.

Check the addresses in broadbandchecker.btwholesale.com (select "Address Checker" from the top right, then postcode, then choose house number)

If it says "WBC FTTP" available, then simply place the order and whatever is necessary will happen - and you won't have to pay extra.

If it doesn't - or if it says "FTTP on demand" - then Openreach FTTP is not available to order. When they get around to extending the network to those properties, you are correct in saying they could either lay new lead-in ducts or they could install poles. But they will do it in their own time, when they're ready (e.g. when they decide they want to close down the copper network in your area). Maybe not for many years.

There's no way to "nudge" them to prioritise your street over all the other thousands of streets they are doing, unless you want to go down the route of FTTP On Demand. This typically costs upwards of £10,000, and it will cost you a non-refundable £300 just to start the order rolling and find out exactly how much it costs. And you have to pay the whole amount up-front within 30 days of receiving the quote. And there are no guaranteed lead times, so you could still be waiting a very long time. (I had it done in 2018-2019, when it was much cheaper, and it took nearly 18 months)

I only know one national reseller of FTTP on Demand and that's Cerberus. Even BT don't sell it. So you're also committed to paying for a business-rate FTTP service for 2 years, although after that, you can switch to any regular FTTP service provider.

Seriously: if you need high-speed broadband in that part of the street, then just take 4G/5G or Starlink for now, and wait for Openreach to deliver in their own sweet time.

Edited by candlerb (Fri 27-Dec-24 18:29:27)

In reply to a post by Moto:

Have they tried to order FTTP. If you are able to order, Openreach are prepared to duct the fibre to you. That appears to be the policy in my Direct In Ground area - no order no duct work.

It appears that FTTP isn't available to order -- I assumed this was because of the lack of ducts, but perhaps not.

You could try the senior escalations teams, by emailing the CEO...

https://www.ceoemail.com/s.php?id=ceo-9593&c=Openrea...

Can you drop me a PM with the postcode and house number?