Solid orange light on hub6

[Gimblett]

I am hoping somebody can help.  We have had an ongoing problem with my mother-in-law's internet since 14 December.  Her hub6 keeps going to solid orange (no internet) and nobody has been able to provide a lasting solution including BT executive complaints.  These are the facts:

She lives next door to us in an annexe.  We have had no issues whatsoever with our own broadband during this period.

We are on copper ADSL in a rural area near Glastonbury in Somerset with no plans for FTTC or FTTP in the foreseeable future.  She gets approx 7 Mbps down and 0.8 Mbps up on a good day.

She has had her service in the annexe since 2012.  Her current hub6 was provided several years ago.  It has worked reliably since then apart from a single instance of her hub going to solid orange on 15 November 2025

Around 12 August 2025 we changed her landline number (my wife registered her PoA at this time) because of the high number of spam calls she was receiving.  This was done although somehow she has continued to receive spam calls sporadically.

We have reported the fault to 0330 1234 150 each time it has happened (so many times I have lost count now).  Each time, with varying degrees of difficulty, I have ended up speaking to someone who has been able to rectify the fault remotely.  On one occasion the Guide said the ‘flex port’ had been turned off but he couldn’t tell me what this was or why it had happened.

When the hub has been remotely reset, the light usually stays blue for a few days but then goes to solid orange again.  This often happens while my mother-in-law is actually using her iPad,

My mother-in-law is almost 96.  She has poor eyesight and is very frail.  She is a very light user of the internet (just the odd email and web browsing).  Apart from her iPad she only has a PC (which she never uses) and a printer connected to  her hub.

On 23 December an Openreach engineer was sent to investigate.  He had been told that the fault was with the landline (which has at all times been working as it should) but was happy to investigate the orange light on the hub.   He was onsite for almost three hours.  He checked everything inside and outside (where he remade a connection).  He installed a new master socket internally and checked all the extension sockets.  He also drove to the cabinet so he could check all the connections back to the exchange.  He then rang me to say that everything was clear and he concluded that the internet must have been “switched off’ by BT and I should ring faults to ask for it to be restored.  I did and it was but, as usual, it dropped out a few days later.

Following advice on this forum, I raised an official complaint with BT on 5 January.  I have explained everything but the problem remains.  The lady dealing with my complaint insisted on sending another engineer who was supposed to come last Thursday but did not. Nobody contacted us to say the visit had been cancelled.  My executive complaints lady has told us that somebody elsewhere in BT cancelled the visit because they could reset the hub remotely which it seems they did as the hub was showing solid blue again.  Needless to say, the hub is this evening as I write this showing solid orange and my mother-in-law has no internet.

Also, following advice on this forum, I rang 17070 from my mother-in-law's landline a couple of weeks ago which returned the correct  number.

I, my wife and my mother-in-law are at our wits' end.  Is there anybody out there who can help us?

[imjolly]

When you rang 17070 option 2 was the line silent or was there and noise?  Any noise is a problem and needs reported.  As you are now dealing with Executive Level Complaints you need to get back in touch with complaint handlers 

[Katie_B]

Hello @Gimblett. 

Welcome to the BT Community. 

I am sorry to hear that the hub light has turned solid orange again. 

When you have a moment please check your community inbox.

Speak soon, 

Katie 🙂

[Gimblett]

When I rang 17070 it was to confirm that, following the change of telephone number, my mother-in-law's line was correctly attached to the new number which it is (still not sure how so many spam callers still get through however).  So today I rang 17070 again from her landline and selected option 2 as suggested.  There is a faint buzz on her phone line (all extensions and the master socket) but the Openreach engineer who attended on 23 December did a full check on her internal wiring (including fitting a new master socket) and then traced her line back to the cabinet and then back to the exchange.  He said there was no fault with the line.  We were supposed to have another engineer visit last week but, as I said, that was cancelled centrally.  Hub is still solid orange this morning btw.

[WSH]

Solid orange suggests it’s connected to the internet but failing to talk to BT’s network.  This is often a software problem, such as account configuration etc.  Hence the reason the engineer did not see a fault on the line, I suspect.

You could try a factory reset of the hub if you’ve not already done so.  (Hold the reset button on the back down until it restarts.  It takes about 30 seconds).  Be aware that this will drop it back to default settings, so any custom settings will need setting up again.

There is a slight possibility it is a failing power supply, so a replacement from BT would be worth a try.  The faint buzz may be due to this or due to interference from another electrical device.  Does the failure coincide with something turning on, such as when the heating kicks in etc.?

If you are checking it via a cordless phone, they often give a faint buzz.  (Which is normal for them).   A phone plugged directly into the socket is better.

[Gimblett]

Thank you so much for your reply WSH.  When the Openreach engineer visited, he suggested doing a factory reset on the hub which I did while he was present. The hub booted back to solid orange however.  We also tried a spare hub6 that he had on his van which also only booted to solid orange.  I have however also wondered if my mother-in-law's hub is causing a fault up the line.  In this case, replacing the hub whilst the internet service was already down remotely would not prove anything either way.  I have suggested to a couple of the Guides that resetting the fault remotely and then trying a new hub at my end might be worth a try but no takers so far.  Re checking the landline this morning: The faint buzz was audible on my mother-in-law's big button wired-in phone which was what I also used to test the master socket.  She does have a DECT hands free phone with an additional handset and I can hear the same faint buzz on those handsets too.  Hope this clarifies and thanks again for your help.