In reply to a post by partial:

In reply to a post by baby_frogmella:

Most people would give an arm and a leg to be in your position!

Actually "most people" would prefer to be able to choose their provider and pay lower prices as a result. If INFL offer a compelling service there would be no need to lock out AAISP, IDNET and ZEN. The Openreach lockout is the most anti-competitive practice in telecoms today. Virgin are also highly active in this area.

The OP can choose from an ISP being connected to INFL fibre - 5 residential and 25 business ISPs. Which is probably not that different had he been connected to Openreach fibre instead

https://www.ifnl.net/availableisps

Anyway if the likes of FluidOne and Timico are able to provide a service on INFL's network, then that begs the question why aren't AAISP and Zen, even if just for biz customers?

At the end of of the day the OP can order a pure FTTP service starting at £28 per month (no line rental) for a 60 Mbps connection which in anybody's book is a decent price for a good speed. If the OP is looking for bargain basement deals from TalkTalk, Vodafone, PlusNet etc then he should ask the developer to rip out the fibre and ask Openreach to install good old copper instead. He then literally has 100s (if not 1000s) of ISPs to choose from

Edited by deleted (Tue 31-Oct-17 09:43:34)

And as any part of selecting a house people should check what services are available. If those services aren't what they want then go and find a different house. If for some other reason it is the only house you can go with then unfortunately you have to live with what services are there - good and bad.

There are still plenty of houses that don't have mains gas but if you didn't notice that when buying the house then you couldn't really blame the seller.

Indeed, folks should do their research before buying a property. If choice of ISPs is of more importance than speeds then they should ensure copper is available.

And I'd personally expect this sort of thing i.e. restrictive covenants that stop Openreach fulfilling even the existing USO to be raised on the searches by a solicitor

In reply to a post by DougM:

IMHO, this is exactly what the country needs to begin to break down the BT monopoly. Fully independent providers with no depedency on BT for last-mile connectivity.

Who is this BT?

Don't Openreach provide the line's. You can then choose pretty much any isp for broadband & telco services.

In the op case they are more restricted. Which is wrong. As it means your choice of telco & isp is restricted to far less than normal.

I'm sure if the BT Group were the only choice for isp & telco Ofcom would be down on them like a tonne of bricks....

Edited by deleted (Tue 31-Oct-17 10:56:41)

Openreach are still part of BT group and "BT" is useful shorthand for what people commonly understand.

I don't agree. Virgin Media does not yet cover more than half of households; the latest figures show Virgin Media coverage at ~44%, almost none of which is outside towns/cities. When Virgin Media crosses 50% then I'll agree that the majority of homes no longer need BT for fixed line services, but we're not there and the other infrastructure providers don't yet make a dent.

My whole point in this thread is that companies like IFNL are an effective way to accelerate toppling the monopoly created by the former nationalised telecommunications industry. Let's not attack them because they're not Openreach.

For me, the litmus test for the effectiveness of splitting-off Openreach would be to see BT Retail offer Infinity over these 3rd party wholesale networks!

Agree 100%.

I've not yet committed to buy this new-build, yet I've already spoken to three of the ISPs and a number of existing customers. There is no way I'll drop hundreds of thousands of pounds on a house without doing my homework!

According to TBB it is over 50%. Plus other providers including wireless, fibre, etc BT do not have over half.

IFNL is not a way to tackle a monopoly as it just means that the households only have one choice of a wholesale provider that has no oversight. I am not attacking IFNL but thinking that going from one provider that has controls on how much it can charge and what it has to wholesale to a different provider that has none of those controls is to me not a way to get rid of a monopoly (a monopoly that does not exist in more than half of the country).

There is nothing stopping IFNL from installing in BT areas if they have a better product that is cheaper than BT - but they can't do it cost effectively, they can only do that where they have an effective monopoly on customers.

BT retail could offer services over other networks but are unlikely to for the same reason most ISPs don't currently offer services over Openreach FTTP - it just isn't big enough to make it viable to invest in the admin resources to do it.

If IFNL had 20% of the country then BT retail would quite possibly use it as it would be worth the investment in setup costs.

In reply to a post by DougM:

My whole point in this thread is that companies like IFNL are an effective way to accelerate toppling the monopoly

By creating another monopoly?

These schemes will not break anything other than people who realize that they are trapped into a small group of companies and not the massive choice you have with a normal telephone line.

These schemes will only ever cover new estates. Never be run out to everyone else. Simply due to the cost to the companies.
We already have a great network provided by the former nationalised telecommunications industry. If it was not for that, we would be stuck in the dark ages in many area's where the cost to provide a service does not provide a profit to a company.