Q re broadband installation

[Spike]

In anticipation of going over to FTTP when my current contract for FTTP and
phone ends later this year, I’m looking at the various providers’
offerings.

But the question I am posing at this point is: when FTTP is ordered, which
installer undertakes the work? Some firm contracted to the supplier?
Openreach? Bodge (IT) & Scarper?

Any gotchas to beware of?

I’m concerned about a one-man band doing a botched job as far as the
physical installation is concerned.

TIA

[Spike]

Post by Spike
In anticipation of going over to FTTP when my current contract for FTTP
and phone ends later this year

That’s “…FTTC and phone…”

[Graham J]

Post by Spike
In anticipation of going over to FTTP when my current contract for FTTP and
phone ends later this year, I’m looking at the various providers’
offerings.
But the question I am posing at this point is: when FTTP is ordered, which
installer undertakes the work? Some firm contracted to the supplier?
Openreach? Bodge (IT) & Scarper?
Any gotchas to beware of?
I’m concerned about a one-man band doing a botched job as far as the
physical installation is concerned.

Depends who you order from, and where you are geographically.

From a mainstream supplier (Zen, A&A) the installation will be by
Openreach or one of their subcontractors (Quinn, Kelly), or by another
fibre installer supporting that area, possibly CityFibre.

They should be able to tell you before you place an order.

If you order from County Broadband or similar, all bets are off.

Think about how you want to continue your landline phone service (if you
still have one). The BT Cloud Voice Express product that BT might force
on you has many problems, several of which have been reported here.

[Spike]

Post by Graham J

Post by Spike
In anticipation of going over to FTTP when my current contract for FTTP and
phone ends later this year, I’m looking at the various providers’
offerings.
But the question I am posing at this point is: when FTTP is ordered, which
installer undertakes the work? Some firm contracted to the supplier?
Openreach? Bodge (IT) & Scarper?
Any gotchas to beware of?
I’m concerned about a one-man band doing a botched job as far as the
physical installation is concerned.

Depends who you order from, and where you are geographically.
From a mainstream supplier (Zen, A&A) the installation will be by
Openreach or one of their subcontractors (Quinn, Kelly), or by another
fibre installer supporting that area, possibly CityFibre.
They should be able to tell you before you place an order.
If you order from County Broadband or similar, all bets are off.
Think about how you want to continue your landline phone service (if you
still have one). The BT Cloud Voice Express product that BT might force
on you has many problems, several of which have been reported here.

Thanks for the info.

Tentatively, I have a supplier in mind, but it isn’t one of the mainstream
players, hence my question. They are willing to port my number from my
current supplier, although at this point I’m not sure who to, have
reasonably-priced fibre products, a seemingly good modem, and their phone
costs look reasonable too. But as you can gather, in the interim I’m doing
a bit of due diligence, and wanted for a number of reasons to avoid a
bodged install. If that looks to be not an issue, I’ll pursue other aspects
then.

[Woody]

Post by Spike

Post by Graham J

Post by Spike
In anticipation of going over to FTTP when my current contract for FTTP and
phone ends later this year, I’m looking at the various providers’
offerings.
But the question I am posing at this point is: when FTTP is ordered, which
installer undertakes the work? Some firm contracted to the supplier?
Openreach? Bodge (IT) & Scarper?
Any gotchas to beware of?
I’m concerned about a one-man band doing a botched job as far as the
physical installation is concerned.

Depends who you order from, and where you are geographically.
From a mainstream supplier (Zen, A&A) the installation will be by
Openreach or one of their subcontractors (Quinn, Kelly), or by another
fibre installer supporting that area, possibly CityFibre.
They should be able to tell you before you place an order.
If you order from County Broadband or similar, all bets are off.
Think about how you want to continue your landline phone service (if you
still have one). The BT Cloud Voice Express product that BT might force
on you has many problems, several of which have been reported here.

Thanks for the info.
Tentatively, I have a supplier in mind, but it isn’t one of the mainstream
players, hence my question. They are willing to port my number from my
current supplier, although at this point I’m not sure who to, have
reasonably-priced fibre products, a seemingly good modem, and their phone
costs look reasonable too. But as you can gather, in the interim I’m doing
a bit of due diligence, and wanted for a number of reasons to avoid a
bodged install. If that looks to be not an issue, I’ll pursue other aspects
then.

iDNet seem to be showing up with a good reputation.

[Theo]

Post by Spike
Tentatively, I have a supplier in mind, but it isn’t one of the mainstream
players, hence my question. They are willing to port my number from my
current supplier, although at this point I’m not sure who to, have
reasonably-priced fibre products, a seemingly good modem, and their phone
costs look reasonable too. But as you can gather, in the interim I’m doing
a bit of due diligence, and wanted for a number of reasons to avoid a
bodged install. If that looks to be not an issue, I’ll pursue other aspects
then.

Are they a national ISP, or do they only offer service to a limited local
area?

The nationals are typically using infrastructure from a national network
(Openreach, Cityfibre) or their own (Virgin). The locals are often using
their own infrastructure. The infrastructure owner (or their contractors)
are the one doing the installation.

Can you tell us your proposed supplier? Somebody might have more experience
of their installation practices.

Theo

[Spike]

Post by Theo

Post by Spike
Tentatively, I have a supplier in mind, but it isn’t one of the mainstream
players, hence my question. They are willing to port my number from my
current supplier, although at this point I’m not sure who to, have
reasonably-priced fibre products, a seemingly good modem, and their phone
costs look reasonable too. But as you can gather, in the interim I’m doing
a bit of due diligence, and wanted for a number of reasons to avoid a
bodged install. If that looks to be not an issue, I’ll pursue other aspects
then.

Are they a national ISP, or do they only offer service to a limited local
area?
The nationals are typically using infrastructure from a national network
(Openreach, Cityfibre) or their own (Virgin). The locals are often using
their own infrastructure. The infrastructure owner (or their contractors)
are the one doing the installation.
Can you tell us your proposed supplier? Somebody might have more experience
of their installation practices.

I was looking at 1pBroadband, who on the surface appear to offer a seamless
broadband and phone transfer, with a good router (Technicolor DGA0122) and
low prices for the phone side of things. They are available in my area.

[Graham J]

Spike wrote:

[snip]

Post by Spike
I was looking at 1pBroadband, who on the surface appear to offer a seamless
broadband and phone transfer, with a good router (Technicolor DGA0122) and
low prices for the phone side of things. They are available in my area.

Looked at their website. Saw the phrase Carrier Grade Security. This
might also mean Carrier Grade NAT (CGNAT). Could give you all sorts of
problems if you need a static public IP or expect to send emails to
recipients who use security such as checking blacklists

Ask them about GGNAT - also, do they offer IPV6. If they don't
understand the question, avoid them.

[Theo]

Post by Graham J
[snip]

Post by Spike
I was looking at 1pBroadband, who on the surface appear to offer a seamless
broadband and phone transfer, with a good router (Technicolor DGA0122) and
low prices for the phone side of things. They are available in my area.

OK, I checked an address I know only has Openreach FTTP and they say they
can serve it, so I'm guessing they're reselling the Openreach service. That
means they're one of many ISPs to do so. So the question is whether they
are a good ISP or you could do better with another Openreach ISP.

Post by Graham J
Looked at their website. Saw the phrase Carrier Grade Security. This
might also mean Carrier Grade NAT (CGNAT). Could give you all sorts of
problems if you need a static public IP or expect to send emails to
recipients who use security such as checking blacklists

'Carrier Grade Security' is one of those meaningless things. They're a
carrier, so their stuff is carrier grade by definition. I'm not sure it is
talking about CGNAT.

$ host www.1pbroadband.com
www.1pbroadband.com has address 92.26.95.116
$ whois 92.26.95.116
inetnum: 92.24.0.0 - 92.29.255.255
netname: OPAL-DSL
descr: TalkTalk Communications Limited
country: GB
route: 92.26.0.0/15
origin: AS13285

So it's possible they're reselling a service from TalkTalk. TalkTalk have a
*lot* of public IP space:
https://bgp.tools/as/13285#prefixes

(it may also be their website is hosted on Talktalk and they have their own
systems, but I'm not finding anything in BGP for 1pBroadband or their
company name 'Telecommunications Management Limited')

Post by Graham J
Ask them about GGNAT - also, do they offer IPV6. If they don't
understand the question, avoid them.

It's also worth bearing in mind the upload speed on Openreach FTTP is a
fraction of the download speed. They don't mention that very clearly.

Theo

[Graham J]

Theo wrote:

[snip]

Post by Theo
It's also worth bearing in mind the upload speed on Openreach FTTP is a
fraction of the download speed. They don't mention that very clearly.

So it depends on what you want to do with your internet connection. If
you require significant upload speeds (perhaps you plan to use the
connection to host websites) then this might be relevant. But for most
people - even if they use cloud storage a lot - the upload speed isn't
very important.

[Nick Finnigan]

Post by Spike

Post by Theo

Post by Spike
Tentatively, I have a supplier in mind, but it isn’t one of the mainstream
players, hence my question. They are willing to port my number from my
current supplier, although at this point I’m not sure who to, have
reasonably-priced fibre products, a seemingly good modem, and their phone
costs look reasonable too. But as you can gather, in the interim I’m doing
a bit of due diligence, and wanted for a number of reasons to avoid a
bodged install. If that looks to be not an issue, I’ll pursue other aspects
then.

Can you tell us your proposed supplier? Somebody might have more experience
of their installation practices.

I was looking at 1pBroadband, who on the surface appear to offer a seamless
broadband and phone transfer, with a good router (Technicolor DGA0122) and
low prices for the phone side of things. They are available in my area.

Company number 03592271, officers have a postcode of NW9 5AB, as does
utility warehouse. Apparently involved with Telecom plus in 2017.

[Andy Burns]

Post by Nick Finnigan

Post by Spike
I was looking at 1pBroadband,

Company number 03592271, officers have a postcode of NW9 5AB, as does
utility warehouse. Apparently involved with Telecom plus in 2017.

They and other companies have directors in-common, e.g

<https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/officers/DYNkLjadrIx58J5oArWwptaTpzw/appointments>

Not exactly unusual, and there's a web of majority ownership amongst
those companies.

I pay for a 1pmobile SIM for my brother (it helps to ensure I can keep
in touch with him) they've been OK for 5 years. They did introduce a
minimum spend rule for existing customers, but not for new customers, if
you actually spend the credit, rather than expecting it to last, unused,
for the longest time, it's not had much effect.

[Graham J]

Spike wrote:

[snip]

Post by Spike
Tentatively, I have a supplier in mind, but it isn’t one of the mainstream
players, hence my question. They are willing to port my number from my
current supplier, although at this point I’m not sure who to, have
reasonably-priced fibre products, a seemingly good modem, and their phone
costs look reasonable too. But as you can gather, in the interim I’m doing
a bit of due diligence, and wanted for a number of reasons to avoid a
bodged install. If that looks to be not an issue, I’ll pursue other aspects
then.

By definition, FTTP does not support voice, so you will need some form
of VoIP

Some ISPs will offer their own proprietary VoIP solution, which will
likely require you to use their pre-configured (and probably locked)
router. If you want to use your own router for any reason (mine would
be multiple LAN-to-LAN VPNs) then the ISP-provided router will be
unsuitable.

So it is worth researching the VoIP solution first. Be aware that
porting a landline number will kill any associated FTTC service.

Until last Easter the reverse was also true, in that converting from
FTTC to FTTP even with the same supplier cancelled the landline voice
service and the number would immediately be permanently lost. It
appears that OFCOM has decreed that such numbers must be kept available
for porting to another provider for at least a few weeks. Personally
I don't trust that sort of assurance - it's a bit like the law against
murder - it doesn't bring the victims back to life!

I suggest you get FTTP, arrange your desired VoIP solution, then cancel
the FTTC.

[Spike]

Post by Graham J
[snip]

Post by Spike
Tentatively, I have a supplier in mind, but it isn’t one of the mainstream
players, hence my question. They are willing to port my number from my
current supplier, although at this point I’m not sure who to, have
reasonably-priced fibre products, a seemingly good modem, and their phone
costs look reasonable too. But as you can gather, in the interim I’m doing
a bit of due diligence, and wanted for a number of reasons to avoid a
bodged install. If that looks to be not an issue, I’ll pursue other aspects
then.

By definition, FTTP does not support voice, so you will need some form
of VoIP

Yes, I was aware of that.

Post by Graham J
Some ISPs will offer their own proprietary VoIP solution, which will
likely require you to use their pre-configured (and probably locked)
router. If you want to use your own router for any reason (mine would
be multiple LAN-to-LAN VPNs) then the ISP-provided router will be
unsuitable.

Good point.

Post by Graham J
So it is worth researching the VoIP solution first. Be aware that
porting a landline number will kill any associated FTTC service.

I was aware of that, the plan was to do the change in the last month of the
current contract.

Post by Graham J
Until last Easter the reverse was also true, in that converting from
FTTC to FTTP even with the same supplier cancelled the landline voice
service and the number would immediately be permanently lost. It
appears that OFCOM has decreed that such numbers must be kept available
for porting to another provider for at least a few weeks. Personally
I don't trust that sort of assurance - it's a bit like the law against
murder - it doesn't bring the victims back to life!
I suggest you get FTTP, arrange your desired VoIP solution, then cancel
the FTTC.

That was one of the ways forward, I was exploring a particular solution
that seems to have a number of advantages (I mention them in another post).

[Peter Johnson]

Post by Spike
In anticipation of going over to FTTP when my current contract for FTTP and
phone ends later this year, I’m looking at the various providers’
offerings.
But the question I am posing at this point is: when FTTP is ordered, which
installer undertakes the work? Some firm contracted to the supplier?
Openreach? Bodge (IT) & Scarper?
Any gotchas to beware of?
I’m concerned about a one-man band doing a botched job as far as the
physical installation is concerned.
TIA

Depends, doesn't it?
Who owns the FTTP network? BT or someone else?
If it is BT then BTO will do the work.
If it is someone else, like City Fibre, then their agents will do the
work. THey don't use one-man-bands.