Line Damage

[mikejay97]

Anyone know where I stand with this its gone on for over 11years now and I have had enough I will try and make it quick. Moved into property in 2010 was with orange connection was useless had many openreach visits tell me line was faulty nothing they could do. Swapped went wit BT thinking they would fix it being they are openreach they said same line damaged under road. Said i have 4 wires 2 pairs into home and 2 are completely snapped 400meters from my house and the existing 2 are damaged but working at the same spot. Most likely been cut through under the road or water has degraded them as they are aluminum not copper. Openreach eventually after many engineers visits agreed to replace the line and marked my house up  ready for the line. But someone higher up the chain of command said no it was too costly there not doing it. BT technical in newcastle got involved and escalated my case but in the end all they could do was offer me half price package. Every year I have to ask for a discount when my package renews and BT claim I have no Fault. My last package i was put on bt halo fiber 2 I am paying £43.80pm for a 20mbps download with 5mbps upload originally my connection was 33.4mbps unsure of uploads so it has gotten worse over the years. But now bt claim that the max my line and area can manage is 27mbps down and 5mbps upload. My line profile says max down 27.74 and max up 20mbps. At 5mbps I can  not make video calls as my connection is so slow and my cctv can not be viewed away from home and my son can not do his online game streaming. Who can I contact to get my line replaced once and for all as I have put up with this for 11years.

Thanks Mike   

[imjolly]

Do you have dial tone on your landline?  If so then dial 17070 option 2 should silent and any noise reported to151 as phone fault

[gg30340]

Short answer is no one. 

Openreach are responsible for the line/infrastructure and you are not their customer, BT is.

Openreach will generally only replace a line if there is a fault which is resulting in no service and even then they will generally only replace the bit of line that has the fault/broken wires.

You could report a fault to BT but as you have already stated, your line is within the estimated speeds that BT have quoted you so it is doubtful that they would entertain a fault.

Moving to a different provider, unless it's Virgin, will make no difference because they all use the same line from the cabinet to the property.

Your speeds do not warrant you being on Halo2 so you should consider "down grading" to Halo 1.

Another option could be looking at mobile broadband. This would depend on the strength of mobile signal you get at your property but assuming it is good and you can get at least 3g/4g there are numerous unlimited packages available for less than you are paying at the moment.   You would be supplied with a mobile router that your devices would connect to in the same way as they connect to the BT Smarthub and unless you are an exceptionally heavy user it should suite your needs.

[-Richie-]

One possible option would be to have a 2nd line installed, then cancel the 1st line once active.
There's normally a cost for the 2nd line install and you might also have to pay excess construction charges.

How much difference is there between your connection and your neighbours ? this could be expesive, is it worth what you could gain ?

[mikejay97]

Thanks bt are sending an engineer out monday as they tested the line and told me what I already know there is a line fault.Even though the person on chat today said i had no faults🤣 mobile 4g is an option I have been thinking. Second line i would think will be a no as all lines are buried round here and we have no overhead cables so would involve digging everywhere up. 

[Starwire]

Is your house fed by a Pole or does it come from Underground?

Most houses fed by a UG cable have 2 pairs, usually Pair 2 will be DIS at the DP or the first Cable Joint it goes to from your house.

I doubt the line is Damaged as you say. It sounds like you just have a ‘Low Grade’ Line.

I’d hazard a guess you live on a Boomer Estate, aka one built during the early 60’s to the late 70’s.

Back then it was common for the GPO to use Aluminium Cable due to the cost of Copper at the time.

The earlier your house was built the better as they used a higher grade Aluminium and a bigger gauge, usually 0.9mm. As time went on though they started using smaller gauges and by the mid to late 70’s it was 0.5mm and was as brittle as anything.

Also unfortunately the GPO had this amazing idea of using something called D.I.G, Direct in Ground when putting in cable as opposed to using Duct so without digging up pavements and roads a lot of the joints are inaccessible without the need for costly Civils work.

Openreach are now on a massive build project to get everyone up and running with FTTP. They were originally aiming to get it done in 20+ years but they’re accelerating it and ideally want it done in 15 years so chances are unless said length of Ali Cable goes faulty and you lose your phone service you’ll have to make do with what you perceive as slow broadband until such time they upgrade your area with FTTP.

[mikejay97]

Yes you are correct built around 1976 I think and yes no ducting just laid in the ground.All engineers have said the same 2 of the pair are completely dead and the other 2 are very poor at 400meters I think from my home buried under the road😩 also engineers told me about the low quality aluminum cables. I could live with the slow download if they offered some discount although I could do with the upload increasing as the line says ip profile is 20mbps and I only get 5mbps. Also my line speed has decreased from 35mbps to 20 mbps over the years so it must be getting worse.

[imjolly]

as @gg30340 posted previously with the max speeds you can get I cannot see the point in having a fibre 2 package when you cannot even get the max speed of fibre 1  downgrade should be cheaper.

the up profile for all connections with Fibre 2 is 20mb but that does not mean you will get that speed.  you get as fast as your line can handle

[mikejay97]

Just an update openreach did a great job today more than all other visits we had 3 engineers for about 2 hrs.  The line has a bridge fault on it and is damaged 27mtrs from my house. The bridge fault is because the line is damaged and also earthed. They tried pinpointing my line in the ground with a detector but due to it being earthed it was beeping all up the street everywhere. But 27mtrs from my house and 35mtrs the other way from box to my house was a newish water stop **bleep** grid and paving slab. They think my line is damaged at this spot so have requested it is dug up so they can fix it. Still need a dig but its not in the main road as 1st thought. The engineer said i should not have been sold halo 2 as no one in our town will ever get much more than 30mbps because of the aluminium lines.1 pair are completely dead at the 27mtr point and are bridged to the pair still in use.

[mikejay97]

Openreach dug the wires up but could not find any damage but while they where pulling on them my connection kept dropping so they replaced a 2mtr section with new and 2 joint boxes. The speed has certainly increased to an acceptable level of fibre essential. I have been testing and get around 36mbps down and 9.5mbps up now. But I am still concerned that a checker says my line still has a bridge tap and that eventually the speed will slowly decrease like it has done other times after the dlm has been reset. Do these figures look ok? the engineer  told me there was an internal fault in the 2mtr section and I have no bridge tap this was on 23/11 but the bridge tap test date says it still has one on the 24/11? How reliable is this data as bt also say my lines fine now.