Fibre Broadband Availability Checker estimated speed appears to be wrong.

[jsmithalpine]

Fibre broadband has been available in our area for quite some time.

But whenever I do a check it always comes back with an estimate less than 15Mb about 12.7Mb.  With this reading BT will not supply the Fibre product.

Properties on either side of my property within 50m have estimated readings of 33.9Mb and 28.2Mb.

I'm sure that I am connected to the same cabinet as one of these other properties.

But, it appears that all the house supplied from the one access point in the pathment have the same lower reading as myself.

Speaking to someone I was advised that 3 cabinets supplied the phones to my postcode, although I would have only expected 2.  I wonder if the checker has us connected to the wrong cabinet?

Earlier this week when someone opposite had Fibre installed ( I assume ) the 33.9Mb reading jumped up from 22Mb and the 28.2Mb increase from 17.3Mb.  However, my reading remained the same.

I believe there is an issue with the wholesale information for my property.

Can anyone advise the best approach to get this issue looked into and corrected or proved to be correct?

[James]

Hi jsmithsalpine, we sent this to the department in charge of Fibre rollout. They have just come back with the following, sorry this may not be the answer you're looking for:

This particular area is fed by 2 Fibre cabinets. The result from the availability checker is correct for this line. The customer is on the other cabinet which is closer to their premises. Unfortunately we cannot re-route lines.

James

[jsmithalpine]

Thanks James, I could understand this estimate if we were connected to cabinet 33, which I believe is the other cabinet in question. But it has been confirmed by openreach, as I thought, that my property is connected to cabinet 31 which is closer to my property. Can you please find out if this is the cabinet that is being used for the checks.

[jsmithalpine]

I have just had confirmation from Openreach that my property along with the other two properties mentioned in my first message are connected to the same cabinet 31.

Therefore, given the information which has come back from the Fibre team, I would suggest that there is something wrong with the data about my line ( potentially the access point on the pathment as 5 houses are affected ).

Openreach mentioned about having a bridge case fault raised, is this the best approach as they mentioned that this could take up to 6 weeks to go through?

All I want is Fibre Broadband installed at this property.

[James]

Checking for you, bear with me ...

[jsmithalpine]

James,

Have you heard anything about this?

[Deek]

I also experience exactly the same problem.

It is noteworthy that BT will not confirm the actual connection speed, only the estimated (predicted) speed.

BT has deliberately set an arbitrary barrier making it extremely difficult for most customers to benefit from fibre broadband.  Customer requests for fibre broadband are prevented from being registered on their system if the estimated download speed is below the threshold of 15Mb.  Apparently, my estimated download speed is 12.5Mb, which effectively bars me from obtained fibre broadband.  This is despite the fact that the street cabinet that I am connected is no more than a stone's throw away. What’s going on BT?

I get the impression that BT is only making a percentage of those connected to each enabled cabinet live. BT appears to be manipulating the roll out of fibre broadband across the country as they do not have sufficient engineers trained to meet the demand.

I have been informed by BT helpdesk (after taking advice from BT fibre colleagues) that BT is undertaking a two tier role-out program.  Those who have an estimated connection speed below 15Mb will be connected soon.  I was told in early October to expect to be connected by mid November.  However, the BT helpdesk was unwilling to offer any sort of commitment on this.  I wait in eager anticipation...

As a current BT business customer (who paid for and installed a further dedicated line as suggested by BT in readiness for fibre broadband on 30 September) I am left frustrated and angry that I am unable to deliver the level of service to my business customers that I promised would happen in early October.  So when is BT going to provide me with fibre broadband that I have been expecting, remembering that BT had already told me that my company was in an enabled area and would get the use of fibre broadband as from 30 September.

James, I would welcome your input on this please...

[James]

jsmithalpine: apologies for the delay, we've been investigating your issue. Here's the response back from the Fibre team:

We have revisited this customer's case with Openreach and the original advice given by the helpdesk was not appropriate to FTTC. Further investigation has identified that the routing from the cabinet to the customer's home differs from the other properties quoted and means the route is longer and cannot support a Fibre service of over 15M, which is our current criteria for accepting orders. We apologise for the confusion that has been caused.

Deek: Again your comments were passed to the Fibre team who informed me that we are not currently taking orders for Fibre where download speeds are projected to be less than 15MB. However they now know your views on this and clearly you're not the only one with this opinion. Apologies but I can't go into further detail about BT's plans on this public forum.

James

[Deek]

James,

You appear to be implying that the advice (given on several occasions) by BT Helpdesk was misleading and incorrect.

Your current advice/post implies that BT has no plans to make fibre broadband available to customers whose projected connection speed is below 15Mb. Is this indeed the case?

I would be grateful if you could advise (area by area) what percentage of customers have a projected connection speed of above 15Mb?  Sorry, you will probably not be able to answer this question because those who have a projected connection speed of less than 15Mb cannot be registered on the BT system and therefore this not on BT's radar at the moment.

This is shockingly poor service and an investigation is seriously wanting.

BT should not be permitted to advertise (on TV or on the web) a service that has extremely limited "vision" and take-up.  If my business was to operate in such a cavalier fashion it would be struck-off by Companies House.

[James]

Hi Deek,

In answer to your questions:

BT is planning to include sub-15MB but cannot commit publically to a date at this time.

I’m afraid we can’t go into detail about what percentage of customers have a projected speed below 15MB on a public forum.

James