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BT's Home Phone Standard product

Endersby23 — Sun, 23 Nov 2025 00:22:08 GMT

According to the documentation I've seen, the (new?) BT Home Phone Standard provides an existing customer with an update that provides SIP-type telephony features to existing analogue phone(s) and delivers this over the existing copper access without broadband. This is apparently achieved without a customer visit or any equipment delivery. If this is actually true, how is it achieved?

Re: BT's Home Phone Standard product

iniltous — Sun, 23 Nov 2025 09:11:07 GMT

This looks like the type of inane AI generated answer to a vague or poorly posed question…DV is BT’s standard phone (telephony ) product , replacing the PSTN ( publicly switched telephone network) service , there is a way for DV to be delivered without using a BT SH2 broadband router at the customer’s address…in effect the ‘equipment’ to interface with DV sited at the exchange, not the customer address ,

https://www.bt.com/bt-plc/assets/documents/special-services/pdpl-wholesale-product-handbook.pdf

Basicaly at the customer end nothing changes , no extra equipment is needed, apart from the need to use the national number even for local call , they are in effect connected to ‘DV’ not the legacy PSTN network, this is only a transition product not intended to be used long term , and it’s only for customers that currently have only telephone service (no broadband) on a copper pair

Re: BT's Home Phone Standard product

Endersby23 — Sun, 23 Nov 2025 11:14:18 GMT

Many than thanks for your reply to my query. It pretty much had to be implemented as you described. As a long-long-ago exchange guy, I would be intrigued to know what the converter gubbins actually is. Presumably can't be too costly as with all-DV around the corner it should have a shortish life.

Re: BT's Home Phone Standard product

licquorice — Sun, 23 Nov 2025 11:21:00 GMT

I think you are missing the point. It is DV, just that the 'router' and ATA are at the exchange rather than at the customer's house.

Re: BT's Home Phone Standard product

iniltous — Sun, 23 Nov 2025 12:01:09 GMT

To dumb it down to a basic level , consider how a ‘regular’ broadband DV customer connects to the service , they plug a standard phone into the telephone port of the BT router , fundamentally that’s an ATA (analogue telephone adapter) , a 2wire 50v presentation to a domestic telephone instrument , the hub generates things such as local dialtone , ringing current etc , obviously the SH2 only needs to provide sufficient electrical current etc for pretty short length home wiring and phone cord .
This transitional product is in essence the exchange equipment provided is also an ATA , but needs to be sufficiently more ‘powerful’ to run considerably longer copper pair lines from the exchange to the customer address ….the exchange kit is not simply a a rack of SH2 routers with their ATA’s connected to the ‘telephone only’ customers local loop terminating at the customer wall socket , but for simplicity it can be considered like just like this , the exchange equipment is using BT’s 21CN ( think of this as the broadband access ) with an associated ATA equipment connected to the customer’s cable pair at the exchange , so instead of the phone cord being a few meters in length , it now effectively can be 100’s or 1000’s of meters in length , so the customer has no need for locally powered router , their ‘experience’ is identical to PSTN , in that they make no changes within their homes , with the caveat that the full national number needs to be used .

Re: BT's Home Phone Standard product

Endersby23 — Sun, 23 Nov 2025 23:00:43 GMT

Thanks for your response with its extra detail.

I understand your description of the need for ATA functionality at the exchange but what is actually used for the Home_Phone_Standard product? Nothing would be better than using a port on an existing 21C analogue line card to provide 40mA loop current, detect on hook/off hook and all the other ATA-ish analogue functions: indeed, an existing customer upgrading to this product would already be so connected. However as you'd have to get the analogue line card to communicate with SIP its presumably not what's used !

So I remain intrigued!

Re: BT's Home Phone Standard product

iniltous — Sun, 23 Nov 2025 23:37:30 GMT

What’s your obsession with this completely made up terminology , Home_Phone_Standard product ? , the standard BT telephone product is called Digital Voice , it’s a proprietary VoIP service .

If you are looking for the technical specifications, then this forum is not likely to provide you with them , what’s more they would be of no use to you anyway , it’s unclear what you are trying to accomplish, this transitional product to all intents and purposes works in the same way as DV provided by a local broadband router , without the need for a broadband router to be connected at the customer’s property…the exact details of how it interfaces into BT’s 21CN equipment is irrelevant to the customer , all they need to know is it functions in the same way as if the customers phone was connected to a SH2 phone port .

I suspect you will have to remain intrigued if that basic description is insufficient.

Re: BT's Home Phone Standard product

Endersby23 — Mon, 24 Nov 2025 00:10:13 GMT

Sorry if I've stepped over the mark.

The Home Phone Standard title came from the customer documentation that I was shown.

The rest is just a retiree's fascination for how things have changed but I'll leave it there.

Re: BT's Home Phone Standard product

iniltous — Mon, 24 Nov 2025 07:50:58 GMT

https://www.bt.com/bt-plc/assets/documents/special-services/pdpl-customer-pack.pdf

Anything more technical won’t be available on public forums , you’d need an ‘insider’ to furnish you with details

https://www.bt.com/about/all-ip/case-studies/pre-digital-phone-line

Re: BT's Home Phone Standard product

pddco — Mon, 24 Nov 2025 09:30:25 GMT

@Endersby23 Although not down to schematics level , you may find more background and technical trends etc within past editions of the ITP Journal (IPOEE in the old days!) that, if you are ex BT / PO you can get access to for a retired members fee. Maybe worth a visit to theitp.org website? Just a thought.

Re: BT's Home Phone Standard product

Endersby23 — Mon, 24 Nov 2025 23:52:49 GMT

Pddco: Nice idea! I'd long since forgotten that the Journels were available. I did have a couple that took me right back to Strowger days but I fear they have been disposed of by the powers that be!

Re: BT's Home Phone Standard product

Endersby23 — Tue, 25 Nov 2025 00:07:29 GMT

iniltous: I believe the pdfs you included above have pretty much answered my question diagramatically, ie its a (presumably new) Line Access Gateway that does the functions that I was quering. So thanks.

Re: BT's Home Phone Standard product

HomePhoneStandard — Thu, 07 May 2026 15:17:28 GMT

Thanks for being intrigued. I wouldn't have found what Home Phone Standard was without your enquiry. That it's just a latest name for packaging the PDPL via SOTAP for Analogue product. Thanks to all the contributors here for that.