An update especially for the trolls on this site who don't think anybody else can possibly know what they are talking about!
Today BT replaced the entire drop cable agreeing that REIN was caused by induction between the immediately adjacent power cables and the old figure 8 drop cable.
This is not a solution for every BB fault, it has taken many months of observation, record keeping and snr chart capture from DSLSTATS to provide the evidence. As any engineer knows intermittent faults are the worst!
But if you come to this site for advice do not take any notice of the negative elements and instead trust your intelligence.
For those who have supported me I thank you
P.S. As for those who think that someones use of the English language is inadequate, words fail me!!

Thanks for the update.

Result! Excellent news


Although, I can't really see any trolls here, everyone was trying to help you I think.

But you're right, don't get put off by negative views, faults should be fixed.

I understand why so much of your post concentrated on the negative advice...

However, I'd have preferred that after you told us that BT did something physical, you told us what they did, and what the impact on your service and statistics was. Same routing of cable, just with twisted pair now? Or new routing to avoid power entirely (like your unofficial fix)? SNR doesn't drop? SNR drops by just 1dB instead? Change in what can be heard on the QLT? Changes to the radio hum? Reduced error rates? Has the problem disappeared, or just "reduced to insignificance?"

In reply to a post by WWWombat:

I understand why so much of your post concentrated on the negative advice...

However, I'd have preferred that after you told us that BT did something physical, you told us what they did, and what the impact on your service and statistics was. Same routing of cable, just with twisted pair now? Or new routing to avoid power entirely (like your unofficial fix)? SNR doesn't drop? SNR drops by just 1dB instead? Change in what can be heard on the QLT? Changes to the radio hum? Reduced error rates? Has the problem disappeared, or just "reduced to insignificance?"

Yes I am sorry maybe I didn't say as much as I should have.
Firstly the QLT that was the subject of the first BT visit didn't resolve anything as far as the BB was concerned and in fact I learnt that what I was hearing was normal (background hiss and a little hum) but the guy replaced the old master socket and re-crimped the gable joint in jellies as insurance.
After that visit the REIN was as bad as ever with 6db+ snr hits causing re-syncs. In desperation I tore out the remaining length of figure 8 ty-wrapped to the big incoming power conductors to the house along the barge boards, bear in mind the REIN events/re-syncs only occur on 3-5 days a week so patience is required at each step however I was able to establish the hits had dropped in magnitude to ~3db and that was no longer sufficient to knock out the BB (as it runs a tsnr of 6db). At this stage I was left with a phone wire waving in the wind.
After collecting more evidence Pnet/BT agreed to another visit. The engineer did a very thorough job with his tester, looked at the plots I had printed for him before/after the drop cable move and said yup it's REIN by induction from the power cables and that drop cable needs replacing, initially from the house to the flying part but then said well the whole lot's a bit old I will just do it all.
Given the problems already experienced he decided to clip it to the brickwork rather than the barge board that has the effect of a ~200mm separation along the length concerned (~5Mtrs).
Needless to say whilst BT were here there were no REIN events however today there have been three so far, each one has been limited to no more than 3db. This indicates it is the re-routing of the cable that has done the job and the actual change in wire type is acting as insurance but may solve the wet problem I also had (snr droops in rain).
ATM I am watching and waiting before changing anything else though next up is the RJ11 connection to the router that will go twisted to further reduce susceptibility.
If all goes to plan and the droops remain just 3db I will be able to reduce the tsnr and increase the speed a little. Ohh I almost forgot radio5 live, it still gets blotted out but I did receive a nice letter from the BBC basically saying they have no resources for investigation, it's up to householders to self diagnose, trace the offender and ask them nicely not to do it, or alternatively had I thought of buying a DAB set!!
Once again thank you to the nice people here Sometimes it's just moral support to continue the struggle to achieve how it should be in the first place

Edited by fourtytwo (Wed 07-Sep-16 17:35:05)

What power cables are attached to your wall?

In reply to a post by broadband66:

What power cables are attached to your wall?

I live in a rural village, power is distributed by overhead cables from poles in the street to each house, in my case these cables then run along the barge boards to the garage where the meter is located. Telephones are also distributed overhead from poles in the street and in my case to the same gable as the power and the telephone wire was clipped down the barge board to the power cables...hope this makes sense

Thanks for taking the time to do the update. That adds a lot of information.

It is good that the drop in SNR has fallen into a "manageable" region now, but boy - it still seems like a lot.

In reply to a post by WWWombat:

Thanks for taking the time to do the update. That adds a lot of information.

It is good that the drop in SNR has fallen into a "manageable" region now, but boy - it still seems like a lot.

Its my pleasure, this village has a very severe interference problem the 5live transmitter is only 25 miles away, we don't have any hills and its 10Kw!! I feel like I am living in a metric wave oven given the REIN is powerful enough to blot out the transmitter here!!
In a way this was never a BT problem as the wiring is pretty standard for them and would have been sufficient were it not for the severe REIN in this village, so back to my original question "who is responsible for resolving REIN issues" i.e. the source of the problem ?
Well I have eliminated Ofcom and the BBC so who does that leave ?
Most people in the village are not aware of the problem other than there routers re-syncing sometimes several times a day, I see this same issue on several BB support sites (inexplicable router re-syncs) and wonder just how widespread REIN is. Presumably those of us on long lines with high losses suffer the worst and of course maybe overhead power cabling is partly to blame meaning its a predominantly rural problem like lack of fibre and we all know that will not be fixed anytime soon!! So we enjoy the countryside and pay our penances for being here

The Wireless Telegraphy (Control of Interference from Apparatus) Regulations 2016 (SI 2016/426) give powers to Ofcom to intervene in cases where equipment not intended to act as a radio transmitter is nevertheless radiating in excess of the limits laid down by the EMC Regulations in force at the time it was placed on the market / put into service.

However, Ofcom have very limited investigational resources and these are concentrated on safety of life services in conjunction with other organisations involved - aircraft radio (including navaids), marine radio, radar and radio systems used by the emergency services. They carry out some activity in relation to unlicensed and deliberate transmission in the broadcast bands ('pirate radio') and might intervene in other cases of interference with licensed transmissions.

There is no funding to investigate unintentional interference with broadcast radio and television. If you can localise the source of interference yourself and the user of the offending equipment refuses to act, then Ofcom might become involved, but they are not going to carry out the investigation for you.


Though the 5 Live transmitter is 25 miles away, the signal strength will be considerably lower at your location than at the boundary of the transmitter site. A source of interference much weaker than 10kW input power but local to you will obliterate the signal.