This topic

New BT customer

JJ21 — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 12:11:21 GMT

We just bought a brand new house pre-wired for BT with an Openreach master box in a cupboard under the stairs and phone and ethernet extension sockets in the living room next to the TV aerial socket - where you would expect them to be.

Our BT Smart Hub 2 and TV Box arrived today. BT confirmed they have activated the broadband and the Digital Voice phone service so we thought we were good to go. I didn't order the BT Digital Voice phones because we have a brand new set of phones which are simple and easy to understand. We are pensioners after all.

Because of Digital Voice, which appeared to be obligatory - we didn't opt for it - BT have apparently deactivated all the 'old fashioned' copper wired phone and ethernet extension sockets. So the only place we can plug in our hub and phone base unit is the Openreach master box in the cupboard under the stairs - NOT VERY PRACTICAL!!! - especially for the phone bas unit.

Oh, and the TV box also needs to be connected to the hub, whereas the TV Aerial point, which also has to be connected, is on the living room wall on the other side of the house where you would normally expect it to be. We'd have cables running all over the house if we tried to do this. We've asked BT to reactivate the extension sockets and we waiting on a call to confirm this. They have a also offered to send a Digital Voice adapter and some mini connectors.

BUT my question is - did BT actually tell Barretts who built the house (i) that the BT Openreach box should be located near the TV aerial point because everything had to be connected directly into that box and (ii) that phone and ethernet extension sockets would not be required?

We can't use the TV service yet because we need a TV aerial - booked to be installed next week. But we also find that there is no code for our 'Eternity' brand TV - only a few years old - so we'll be using two different remotes for the TV and the BT TV box going forward - maybe not BT's fault but b***** annoying all the same.

Yes, I know we might not have gone with BT - our first choice was Virgin Media. However Kelly Communications, who do their installation service, identified a problem with the ducting in the street 100m from our house in mid February and STILL haven't fixed it 2 MONTHS LATER. So at the moment BT and Digital Voice are our only option.

Re: New BT customer

imjolly — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 12:32:28 GMT

It is no longer BT Openreach and now just openreach. BT have no say in where or how you home is wired for services that would be the developer and openreach. you do not need to use BT as your provider and you can choose any ISP that uses the openreach network and will supply to your home

once you have DV there is no way back to old copper phone line. you should be able to get adapter from BT which will allow your existing handset to work and powerline adapters to help with your tv connections

have you connected the hub to the openreach ONT on the wall with ethernet cable and other end of cable to the WAN post on the BT Hub? If so you then need to connect the hub by ethernet to the patch panel in cupboard which will give you internet at the outlets in your various rooms

Re: New BT customer

JJ21 — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 12:51:13 GMT

Thanks @imjolly for your suggestion

Have not kept up to speed with the BT/Openreach corporate structure as have been Virgin customers at our previous address for many years.

We were on the phone to BT for ages and they didn't suggest this. We have connected the hub to the ONT with an ethernet cable. However I am not sure what you mean by a 'patch panel'? We have the Openreach box with one ethernet socket only. There is also a small panel underneath, looks a bit like an ethernet extension socket, with what looks like two more ethernet sockets - is this the patch panel?

Re: New BT customer

imjolly — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 13:03:51 GMT

there should be a panel in the wall near the location of ONT and hub where you conenct an ethernet cable from hub to one of sockets on panel and that will provide internet to the room at other end you can do that using the 3 LAN sockets on the hub and connect to 3 sockets on patch panel

Re: New BT customer

JJ21 — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 13:19:28 GMT

Thanks again @imjolly

Probably a stupid question? Does each of the 3 sockets on the patch panel relate to a different extension ethernet socket ? In which case it is trial and error until you find the one near the TV Aerial or so they all connect to all the ethernet sockets and there are 3 because you might need to connect other equipment ?

Re: New BT customer

JJ21 — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 13:23:31 GMT

Actually we only have 2 sockets in what might be the patch panel. I'm not at all convinced we have the installation you are describing.

Re: New BT customer

imjolly — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 13:26:00 GMT

Each connection on the patch panel connects to a specific outlet and only by connecting will you find which is which

If you need more ethernet connections at a specific outlet then you can get a switch with 4 or more outlets for about £10

Re: New BT customer

JJ21 — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 14:45:22 GMT

Update. We have tried connecting the hub to the 'patch panel' (if that is what those two ethernet connections are) as you suggested but that did not work to make the ethernet sockets live.

Anything else you can suggest?

Re: New BT customer

licquorice — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 14:53:11 GMT

Just to clarify, that you have connected the white ONT box to the Hub WAN (red) port with an Ethernet lead and then connected the 2 Ethernet patch panel sockets to 2 of the Hub LAN (yellow) ports with Ethernet leads.

Are the sockets actually cabled? If not, you need to get on to the developer to find out why not.

Re: New BT customer

JJ21 — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 15:00:00 GMT

No we don't have that many spare ethernet cables. We've just seen @imjolly's reply that each 'patch panel' socket relates to a specific outlet - it would be helpful if they'd been labelled as such! We only seem to have two ethernet outlets in the house - one in the living room and one by the front door - lord knows what that one's for.

Why does this have to be so difficult! I'm not a stupid person - I have degrees and professional qualifications up to my eyeballs but this is bonkers. How are the intellectually challenged supposed to manage this?

Re: New BT customer

licquorice — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 15:13:17 GMT

Sorry, but its extremely simple and pretty standard these days. Developers are supposed to wire rooms back to a common point where the hub can be sited and then just patched to whatever rooms require service. You are just connecting your device to the hub indirectly via plugs and sockets rather than one continuous cable. At a mimimum you will require 3 Ethernet patch leads. One from the ONT to the HUB, one from the HUB to the patch panel and one from the room outlet to the connected device.

PS I am also a pensioner so please don't cite age as a problem

Re: New BT customer

licquorice — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 15:20:04 GMT

Have a look here for diagrams.

Re: New BT customer

JJ21 — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 15:20:08 GMT

Have you read the whole thread? This all started because BT deactivated the ethernet and telephone extension sockets as part of the 'wonderful' new totally unnecessary Digital Voice service. We were fully expecting them to be live and connected to the Openreach box but, no, BT had to mess with them. Until @imjolly responded to me I had nothing from BT explaining that additional ethernet cables would be required or that the hub would have to live under the stairs as this is the only place it can be connected directly to the Openreach box. It may be simple and obvious to you but it is not to me.

Re: New BT customer

JJ21 — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 15:22:39 GMT

Very helpful but the first time I have seen this. Was not provided by Openreach or the developer.

Re: New BT customer

licquorice — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 15:32:53 GMT

Internal wiring and connectivity is the responsibility of the customer. For fibre installations, Openreach provide an ONT which of necessity needs to be attached to an external wall. BT or other ISP, then provide a router to connect to the ONT. Any further wiring/connections need to be made by the customer. With digital voice, the Hub is also a DECT base station so further wiring for telephony is not required.

Re: New BT customer

JJ21 — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 16:33:35 GMT

As the purchaser of a new house I didn't have a contractual relationship with Openreach or, as it turns out the developer as this is a housing association property. Neither provided adequate, or in fact any, information and the sockets were not labelled. I only have a contract with BT.

Although BT have provided everything they said they would and promptly too - hoorah for BT - they did not ask about the internal wiring or connectivity in the house. They did not ask where the Openreach box was or what other connections were available. They did not explain in advance that Digital Voice was the only option offered to us and that this would mean the phone and ethernet extension sockets would be deactivated or that we would need multiple ethernet cables, a DV adapter and multiple mini connectors to get the system to work. This is a failure of customer service. It's no good selling me a car if you don't tell how to put fuel into it.

On querying why the sockets were dead, BT was able to check their systems and confirm that they knew there were working copper wired extension sockets installed in the house until they deactivated them. I'd have been happy to opt out of DV and leave it until it has been thoroughly tested out on lots of other more tech savvy people than me, but I wasn't given that choice.

Re: New BT customer

licquorice — Thu, 08 Apr 2021 17:03:44 GMT

Any Ethernet sockets in the house are absolutely nothing to do with BT and could not be 'de-activated', they didn't ask about any internal wiring arrangements because it is not their responsibility. If this is a new house, I would also be extremely surprised if there is a copper feed as well as a fibre feed. Is there an Openreach master socket located anywhere near the ONT? Any phone wiring within the house would have been provided by the developer, possibly to facilitate extending the now deprecated forerunner to Digital Voice, FVA (Fibre Voice Access).

Re: New BT customer

JJ21 — Fri, 09 Apr 2021 16:19:38 GMT

OK my error. The ethernet sockets didn't work because we needed an extra ethernet cable to connect the ONT (note use of appropriate technical name!!! ) via the internal network cabling to the RJ45 ethernet sockets in the house. I admit it wasn't because BT had turned them off. I am puzzled as to why this connection is not hard wired into the house, but it wasn't - we had to use an additional ethernet cable not supplied by anyone else.

However BT did confirm over the phone that they had turned off the copper wire telephone sockets. The email they sent and the Digital Voice literature confirms that these extension sockets no longer work once DV has been activated.

The link you sent to the Openreach wiring guide was super useful. We have now acquired an extra ethernet cable and managed to install a pared down version of Option 2 using the internal network cabling to relocate the hub. We can now plug the hub into the ONT via the ethernet socket in the living room and the phone is plugged into the hub - they are no longer confined to the under stairs cupboard. Both broadband and internet are working - hoo b**** ray!

As regards the telephone sockets and copper wiring, although this is a new house it was built to a spec determined several years ago - completion was delayed by the pandemic - and we were the last to move in in our street. I understand Digital Voice has only been available for a short while so it is likely that all the houses also have copper wired telephone points in the old fashioned way or as you suggest to facilitate the forerunner to DV. BT confirmed to me over the phone that according to their information we definitely had copper wired extensions but these had been deactivated due to Digital Voice being made available. They offered a DV adapter which we could have used to at least get the phone into the living room, if we had had to keep the hub in the understairs cupboard, but that has not been necessary.

I don't think we have an Openreach master socket and we definitely don't have a patch panel. We just have two RJ45 ethernet sockets close to the ONT which are linked to the living room and the front door (???) respectively. Very similar to Option 2 without all the gubbins at the top and over to the right of the diagram in Option 2.

I wish now we had got BT to come and set us up, because I am sure that would have saved a lot of aggro. However having watched all the videos it didn't seem necessary as they made it look oh so simple.

Now to tackle BT TV.... Many thanks for your assistance and to @imjolly too