BT’s Regional Digital Voice Rollout Plan

Surfer01

We are in a rural area and get a number of power cuts every year, sometimes from just under an hour and other times several hours.  We do have an analogue phone that we can plug in when there is a power cut, but it may not work when we are switched to VOIP. 

As mentioned the media totally confuse everyone and this leaves people unsure of what is actually happening. 

giraffe69

" Mobile signal in our area is almost non existent. "

It is in our home but both our mobile phones work perfectly with wifi calling so that at least is not a problem and we have given up our landline.

Surfer01

giraffe69 said:

" Mobile signal in our area is almost non existent. "

It is in our home but both our mobile phones work perfectly with wifi calling so that at least is not a problem and we have given up our landline.

However if you have a power failure, will you still be able to make and receive calls?

Rob5342

Having a battery back up for the router is the best you can do, then you are dependant on whatever power back up the equipment at the other end had (which you are anyway for a phone line)

pete-20-11

Surfer01 said:

We are in a rural area and get a number of power cuts every year, sometimes from just under an hour and other times several hours.  We do have an analogue phone that we can plug in when there is a power cut, but it may not work when we are switched to VOIP. 

As mentioned the media totally confuse everyone and this leaves people unsure of what is actually happening. 

Analogue phones can be plugged into the back of the router, possibly need a little adapter, but it is possible.

For FTTC, street cabinets might have a small battery backup, but if they do, I’m not sure how many hours it would last, maybe 2-3 hours?

Those on FTTP may be better off, as hopefully the exchange has a generator and battery backup! Or it might be the exchange has power - if it’s on a different part of the power grid. 

QrizB

pete-20-11 said:

For FTTC, street cabinets might have a small battery backup, but if they do, I’m not sure how many hours it would last, maybe 2-3 hours?

Those on FTTP may be better off, as hopefully the exchange has a generator and battery backup! Or it might be the exchange has power - if it’s on a different part of the power grid. 

Per OFCOM guidance, "Providers should have at least one solution available that enables access to emergency organisations for a minimum of one hour in the event of a power outage in the premises".

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0016/123118/guidance-emergency-access-power-cut.pdf

(At para 3.7 of that consultation response, it's noted that "power outages could affect larger areas including network equipment at the cabinet or exchange ... guaranteeing an hour’s access at the customer side was not reliable".)

matelodave

In the "good old days" telephone exchanges had ginormous batteries and standby generators but as time has crept on and more stuff has be moved out of exchanges into street cabinets (many people are now connected either by remote subscriber units or stuff in fibre cabinets (FTTC) which only have 3-4 hour battery back-up.

Unless your phone is directly connected to the exchange, which I guess most people wont be nowadays there's a better than even chance that the most back up you'll have is around 3-4 hours.

As @QrizB suggests you may be better off in the future with FTTH with your own battery backup as there are fewer if any active devices in cabinets between you and the exchange. However that is predicated on the exchange or access node (which could be in a cabinet) having decent standby arrangements as well - which is not a given nowadays. Its unlikely to have standby generators unless its a pretty major interconnection node so it will probably still be down to the 3-4 hour capacity of the battery backup.

Everyone gets upset about having the phone off for an hour or two but fails to grasp that during a power cut the loss of power to heating, cooking, lighting, medical devices, DECT phones etc is probably a lot more serious than not being able to make a phone call. Just my opinion you understand. 

We have FTTP and get frequent power cuts some longer than others and obviously we lose our broadband, phone and everything else but the worst was when the water company pulled the phone cables out of the ground and our whole neighbourhood lost comms (both phone and broadband) for over two weeks until it got reinstated, so you should be more worried about infrastructure damage than an hour or so of power outages.

thriftytracey

If they switch will you still have to pay for the line rental?  I guess you do

littleboo

Providers can package a digital voice service how they please, most have a monthly standing charge to have the service on, i.e. "virtual line rental", Vodafone don't as far as I know.

southsidergs

thriftytracey said:

If they switch will you still have to pay for the line rental?  I guess you do

Yes! It's called line rental as it covers the line used to deliver the broadband too