Never ending issues with BT ADSL (and now fibre) Disconnects

HI there, i'm posting this on behalf of my parents who have been having issues with their BT Broadband for many years and it's seemingly getting worse.

There issue being broadband and now fibre disconnections. These being 3-5 minute periods in the day where the homehub disconnects from the internet (light goes orange and supported by uptime stats in the hub) Before investigating originally I assumed it was down to wifi issues in their large stone walled house but having now seen things for myself it seems to be the hubs connection to the outside world. Every disconnection comes with an orange internet light on the homehub.

This has been going on for quite a few years now, many visits from openreach, which have included replacement hubs (they have 8 at last count) the line into their house replaced from the pole along with all phone sockets and they were then persuaded to upgrade to infinity. Even an 10 metre ethernet cable, which even my dad said was ridiculous as its the hubs broadband connection causing the issues. Along with a lot of "going to the exchange and changing a few settings) Nothing has worked. Their fibre speeds when connected are approximately what the bt line checker says they should be.

Part of the problem is that these disconnections are intermittent and it when openreach arrive for their allotted hour the line is working fine. Every phonecall to BT about the problem is treated as if its a new fault and it's been impossible to get anywhere with them. My parents neighbours also think they may be suffering from intermittent disconnects but they are not using the internet enough for anything to be ruled in or out.

They are at their wits end with how to proceed and i was wondering if anyone has any tips as to how to either get the case escalated or how i can conduct any further investigation for them? It just seems impossible to get anyone from BT to acknowledge an issue. BT have on occasion said that they could see the faults on their end but that's it.

Any help would be gratefully received.

Jon B

Which model hubs have been provided by Openreach?

Current model is a 5A. They have had many.

You can use RouterStatsHub to monitor the router so you can see what's happening in terms of Sync speed and Noise margin but you would have to run it on an always-on PC for best results.

Is there any noise on their phone line? Dial 17070 option 2 and listen - it should be silent. This works best on a corded phone.

Does the Automated line checker show any faults? https://www.bt.com/consumerFaultTracking/secure/faul...

There was an issue with the 5A which was fixed with current firmware 4.7.5.1.83.8.204 update.
Check update of modem and disable 5Ghz wifi
Have you always used the BThub for ADSL and Fibre.
I am on ADSL2 and Hub4. It regularly disconnects and reconnects. two or three times a week.
Normally shown by " server not found" when using. Orange light if I go to Hub. Funny it only started when Fibre started roll out in area a couple of years ago.

when openreach arrive for their allotted hour

There isn't an 'allotted hour', there is no time limit on an SFI task.

Ok tried a few things. Had them plug in a wired phone and do the line test. No problems. Completely crackly free.

Routerstats installed on an always on pc. This is a sample of the noise margins from routerstats. You can see the dropouts on there very clearly (the other tabs mirror these)

http://i.imgur.com/xKoeSS1.jpg

Can I suggest you send an e-mail to [email protected] describing in simple terms the problem and asking him if he will arrange for his senior team to look into things for you

I'm sure the boss will help. If not, uurrrgggghhhhhh!

That noise graph is pretty unstable. It could be something in the house causing issues. Do they have a Sky box? They can be notorious for causing noise (especially certain models where the resistors in the power supply were prone to blow). One thing to try would be to turn off as much as possible in the house and see if the noise settles down at all.

That graph was of a particularly bad afternoon. Today it has settled down to relatively stable but with the odd disconnect every couple of hours.

No sky box. I'll ask them to try it with a lot of stuff unplugged but they don't really have much going on apart from basics such as lights/tv's etc.

In reply to a post by 961a:

Can I suggest you send an e-mail to [email protected] describing in simple terms the problem and asking him if he will arrange for his senior team to look into things for you

I'm sure the boss will help. If not, uurrrgggghhhhhh!

Email went in this morning...

Fingers crossed

Be interested to know how things go

Thought i'd post this as things have been resolved.

They sent a chief openreach guy out 2 days after the email. Straight off the bat he suggested that my parents are too far from the cab to be given anything like the projected speed, and are right on the boundaries of it being even acceptable. BT offered a £15 a month reduction to start.

The engineer also found that was 5V on the line that shouldn't have been there, which is apparently consistent with damp. They have moved my parents onto a different line from the cab and magically like that no further dropouts.

Parents are now very happy but extremely annoyed it took a complaint to get something done. BT need to sort their procedures out.

In reply to a post by JonBradley:

Thought i'd post this as things have been resolved.

They sent a chief openreach guy out 2 days after the email. Straight off the bat he suggested that my parents are too far from the cab to be given anything like the projected speed, and are right on the boundaries of it being even acceptable. BT offered a £15 a month reduction to start.

The engineer also found that was 5V on the line that shouldn't have been there, which is apparently consistent with damp. They have moved my parents onto a different line from the cab and magically like that no further dropouts.

Parents are now very happy but extremely annoyed it took a complaint to get something done. BT need to sort their procedures out.

Pleased things are sorted at last

It's clear to me from long dealings with BT that if you can get hold of the right person with the necessary experience virtually any broadband problem can be identified and solved. Remember the whole technology started as a ramshackle way to send data down a couple of wires designed for something completely different and is still developing

The number of engineers is still below what is needed (as can be seen from other threads about BT recruitment drives) and those with high grade skills are like gold dust

From the customers point of view the conventional way of getting your broadband problems sorted is by talking to somebody who you can't understand and who probably doesn't understand you or your problem. I gave up a long time ago

Starting from the top I've found a willingness to organise someone who knows what they're doing to solve the problem provided you don't go off on a rant and don't try to involve them on stuff that can be resolved lower down the chain

Again, glad it worked for you and your folks