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Openreach Voucher

alanrichey — Mon, 29 Apr 2024 18:34:47 GMT

I have just received a letter from Openreach asking me to sign across the £4,500 Government voucher to them, so they can roll out full fibre to our village. The problem is that if I do sign the voucher across then I will have to sign up to a new full fibre package when it is available. But there is no guidance as to how much the packages will cost.

BT are refusing to tell me how much I will have to pay because my account does not support full fibre. So if I do sign the voucher there is a risk I might have to pay a monthly fee well in excess of what I pay now. At the moment we have 'fibre to cabinet' which is working well for me so I don't really need full fibre. But the representative said that unless everyone in the village signed up then we would never get full fibre.

Anyone know the answer ? Or could someone who is already on full fibre give me a clue as to roughly how much I might be paying ?

Thanks

Re: Openreach Voucher

Keith_Beddoe — Mon, 29 Apr 2024 18:46:43 GMT

@alanrichey

Welcome to this user forum for BT Retail phone and broadband customers.

This forum has nothing to do with Openreach.

I assume you mean this scheme https://www.openreach.com/fibre-broadband/fibre-community-partnership

I would expect the cost will vary, depending on which ISP a customer chooses.

Re: Openreach Voucher

alanrichey — Mon, 29 Apr 2024 18:51:15 GMT

I was intending to stay with BT. That is why I requested an idea of the package costs.

Re: Openreach Voucher

iniltous — Mon, 29 Apr 2024 19:24:12 GMT

The price of BT packages is on the website and for the lower speed packages is the same as FTTC , so the price for 40,55 and 80Mb is the same regardless of FTTC or FTTP , you wouldn’t pay any more for BT Broadband than anyone in an area that has had a purely commercial rollout , there isn’t a different price for areas built using public funds to subsidise the costs of building the network.

As stated , DCMS vouchers effective pay ( or subsidise ) the rollout of Superfast/Ultrafast broadband in area that if left to a purely commercial rollout would never make economic sense , if enough residents chose not to take advantage of the DCMS scheme and don’t allow OR to claim that residents voucher then the rollout may not take place .

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/gigabit

As far as I know the only commitment if you claim a voucher ( or it’s claimed on your behalf) is to take a 30Mb or over package , so if for arguments sake you were currently on Fibre Essential ( 40 Mb ) then whatever you pay now is what you would pay on FTTP , but the difference is you would definitely get 40Mb as there is no line length ( rate adaptive ) reduction in speed , obviously if you wanted to take a faster speed , they are also available and the prices are on BT.Com , same as for every other BT or potential BT customer

Re: Openreach Voucher

alanrichey — Mon, 29 Apr 2024 21:18:47 GMT

Many thanks, that makes sense.