Do BT have to connect a phone line to every house?

vet8

We have converted an old stable block into a house, it is some distance from the road as it lies behind other houses. We asked BT for a phone line about 2 years ago and the most ridiculous saga followed, I could write a book about it. Basically BT said we would have to pay more than £2,000 for the phone line as they would have to put in 2 poles and we would have to pay for it.

At the time there was some confusion as to whether the house was a residence or not, we have got that sorted out and have planning permission to use the building as a permanent residence. Does that mean BT should install a line for free? I understand that they have to install a phone line to every house in the country regardless of where it is, is that true?

Alice_Walker

BT can charge for connection, in some cases the first £3,000 of costs is waived, in others it is not. This link details the relevant charges, poles are £800 each so £2,000 would be in the right area.

Browntoa

they have a "universal obligation" to provide a line but not for free

iniltous

As already stated BT (Openreach) have a universal service obligation USO , to provide service to anyone who reasonably requests it, but it isn't at any price, OR's commitment is to foot the first £3000 of any installation, but the excess is paid by the end user, so if you were previously told the excess construction charge was £2000, then the true cost was actually £5000
It doesn't really matter if it's a converted stable or was always a domestic residence, the charge is if the cost of installation exceeds the USO allowance, if you don't agree to pay the excess, then OR have no obligation.
You can offer to do some of the work yourself ( or employ a contractor ) to get the costs down, for example if you agreed to bury a cable (provided this was within your own land, you have no right to install in the public highway, or obviously someone else land, ), then that cost is removed from the quote, you would have to install the cable, that they supply and continue to own, to the required depth of cover etc.
If your quote was for overhead service ( telegraph poles) that is usually the cheapest option , but to supply and install 1 telegraph pole probably costs 10's of 100's of ££'s, add in all the other costs, including the planners time , your excess cost is probably reasonable.
Another way to look at this, once the line is in, OR get about £96 /year , that's what OR get, not the price a service provider charges you ( about £18/month)... So how long, getting £96 PA would it take to recover costs.

vet8

Iniltous, that was a very useful reply, thanks a lot. I was just surprised that the £2000 we were quoted was on top of the £3000 BT have to pay. When the engineer came round he said we needed 2 poles and they were about £1000 each, so that made the £2000 we were quoted. I would personally be surprised if the rest of the installation came to as much as £3000. We are no more than 50 metres back from the road and there is a pole outside our neighbour's house.


I must say that when the engineer called it was a real joke as he said they could dig up the road to lay cables there, BUT as it is an unadopted road they would have to get written permission from the owners of the road and god knows who that is. The first houses were built over 100 years ago.


I did get the general impression from him that he did not want the installation to go ahead at all, he was very negative about every aspect and said that it would not work whatever we tried.

[Deleted User]

vet8 wrote: »

I did get the general impression from him that he did not want the installation to go ahead at all, he was very negative about every aspect and said that it would not work whatever we tried.

He was just pointing out all the obstacles in the way of getting a telephone line to your property. A pessimistic view, or just a realistic one?

Why would he not want to do the work? He'd simply be employed doing similar work elsewhere.

If you pay the costs quoted, perhaps arranging a proportion of the work to be done by your own contractor, there will be no problem.

iniltous

What type of engineer called ?, these days, before a planner visits , you are asked to pay £200-£300 upfront, as previously many people in similar positions to yourself, would get a bespoke quote for service, but wouldnt order service ( probably thinking the fee outrageous) but OR still had the expense of the visit and the planners time to produce the quote ( could be the best part of a day's work) so decided to get a commitment first ( the fee is removed from the quote for the work , should the work proceed )
If the engineer from a failed appointment gave you the info ( the service provider making an appointment they shouldn't have ) then they probably don't have the info a planner would have ,

If the engineer was a planner or survey officer, then you are fortunate to get that 'service' without the upfront fee, unless it's your recollection from the planner visit 2 years ago,
The £3000 figure is a bit of a convoluted figure anyway, BT ( as it was then) would 'spend' 100 man hours before excess charges, a man hour given an arbitrary cost of £30, then if they supply equipment that would be exclusively used by the person ordering service ( so it didn't extend or improve the 'network' just enabled 1 property to get service) those costs were converted in MH's and added as well, those figures were in use 20 years ago , yet seem to still be used these day,
Relatively small construction schemes would exceed the 100 MH's

vet8

iniltous wrote: »

What type of engineer called ?, these days, before a planner visits , you are asked to pay £200-£300 upfront, as previously many people in similar positions to yourself, would get a bespoke quote for service, but wouldnt order service ( probably thinking the fee outrageous) but OR still had the expense of the visit and the planners time to produce the quote ( could be the best part of a day's work) so decided to get a commitment first ( the fee is removed from the quote for the work , should the work proceed )
If the engineer from a failed appointment gave you the info ( the service provider making an appointment they shouldn't have ) then they probably don't have the info a planner would have ,

If the engineer was a planner or survey officer, then you are fortunate to get that 'service' without the upfront fee, unless it's your recollection from the planner visit 2 years ago,
The £3000 figure is a bit of a convoluted figure anyway, BT ( as it was then) would 'spend' 100 man hours before excess charges, a man hour given an arbitrary cost of £30, then if they supply equipment that would be exclusively used by the person ordering service ( so it didn't extend or improve the 'network' just enabled 1 property to get service) those costs were converted in MH's and added as well, those figures were in use 20 years ago , yet seem to still be used these day,
Relatively small construction schemes would exceed the 100 MH's

Sorry for the delayed reply.

I said earlier the entire thing was a farce and it was.

When I initially called BT to get the line installed I said we were some way from the road and they would probably need to put in an extra pole, they said they would send an engineer around to check. We then ended up with two different dates to install 2 separate lines and were told so many different thing it was a total farce, but at the end of weeks of faffing around we had a definite date for the line to be installed and we were told an engineer would come out before that to look at the poles etc. No-one came.

The line installer turned up and the first thing he sad was that we need extra poles, "we know that", I said. He called the engineers' office and they admitted all they had done was look on google earth and seen a pole outside our neighbour's house and assumed that was our house. The line installer had wasted his time!.

He then arranged for a visit from an engineer and that was the rather negative man who said they could not dig up the road unless they had the written permission of the owner and that if they installed poles the neighbours would complain as they always do and they would then have to remove them!

When, after several more months of faffing and getting bizarre quotes and letters we were finally told it would be £2,000 we did not go ahead mostly because it was all so vague. We could not get a firm written quote and were just told this figure over the phone. When we asked for a written confirmation of it so we knew exactly what the costs were they just sent us copies of the stuff we had already received in 3 separate envelopes.

My OH has always been a fan of BT, but this was such a fiasco even he is off them, now. And the reason I mentioned that part about planning permission was that when this engineer came he said we would have to pay because the building was designated as a holiday let and therefore a business and we would have to pay as it was not a house, otherwise it would be free.

iniltous

Part of the problem here is that you speak to BT on the phone, but it's Openreach that are responsible for installing a line and deciding if it's a USO order ( in which case the excess costs calculation is valid)..
if you mentioned that the line is required for a business , then there is no USO as such, a business ordering a line gets no subsidy, if it cannot be provided from existing line plant, they pay for whatever work is required, there is no 'first £3000 free' on a business,
The USO is really only for a persons primary residential address, not holiday homes or any other temporary accommodation , it's raison d'être is that no one should be without service just because they cannot afford it, something that would be hard to argue if it were not that persons main home, so they are probably on firm ground with you, say it's not a business, they will say it's not your primary address.
There are many common issues with USO and business orders, overhead is cheaper than underground, but BT only has the 'right' to install equipment in the public highway, poles in private land, or areas like National Parks are different, they can insist on underground, and it is the case , that poles have been put up in places and had to be taken down and replaced with underground service due to objections from third party's like National parks or 'estate' owners, the 'Lord of the Manor' type of thing
It seems to me that your tale of woe, started with your provider raising an order , when they should have raised a survey, the OR engineer who couldn't fulfill the order BT made (because they never should have raised it without a survey first) sent the job back for survey, and that is where you were getting informal information and pricing.
What should happen is, and is similar for a business line order or a USO residential order , where it's suspected that service cannot be provided by existing line plant, and OR systems indicate the status of addresses, the provider (BT) shouldnt offer service , they say a survey is needed and costs may apply, and if you want to proceed they ask for a deposit, that will be deducted from the costs of provision if you eventually proceed...if you agree , you pay £200 to £300 and a survey officer or planner visits you, discusses the options available, and produces a costing estimate ( business or non primary residential, no £3000 deduction, USO £3000 deduction) and advises your provider , they may also indicate the approximate cost to you while they are on site, but that isn't the quote, that comes from the service provider (BT Consumer)
When they contact you with the costing it's then up to you to proceed or not, you wouldn't get an appointment unless you agree, don't agree they keep the deposit, if it turns out the planner can see a way to give service from existing line plant, you get a standard install price ( not sure if the difference is added to the account as a credit or they refund the £200/£300 and a standard install charge £130 is on the first bill)
BT wouldn't make an appointment for the survey, the OR planner or survey officer would contact you directly and arrange with yourself a convenient time to visit
In your case , it looks like the informal £2000 quote was based on a business line or non USO as 2 poles installed would give a ballpark figure of that
You can get the run around on orders like yours, they are a tiny percentage of 'orders' and obviously many customer service reps for service providers ( like BT and all the others) are not familiar with these unusual circumstances, that's not an excuse for them though, they should have specialist order teams for out of the ordinary requests like yours
Sorry about be epic length of this

vet8

iniltous,


Thanks very much for that information. Just to clarify this is our only residence, the original planning was for a holiday let, but we got it converted into a house and live here permanently.


I think we might try again and see if we can get more sense this time.

iniltous

If you try again, then don't order on line but speak to whatever provider you want to use, if everything is done correctly they shouldn't appoint the job, be suspicious if they try, they should say a survey is needed, if they try to appoint I would tell them the address is not served and has never had service in the past, and needs a survey, they should ask for a deposit £200/£300, if that happens you know at some point you will be contacted by OR,
the sort of good news is, if 2 poles are what's needed, that probably wouldn't exceed the USO allowance of £3000, ( so you pay a standard install fee) ensure they know it's your primary address, and not a business address when the OR surveyor calls