BT is failing to hit quality targets for the unbundling of its local telecoms network, the Office of the Telecommunications Adjudicator (OTA) has revealed.
In his latest monthly update, published on Friday, telecoms adjudicator Peter Black noted that, while the rate of unbundling was progressing well — 850,000 lines unbundled and counting — only 78 percent of lines are being succesfully delivered. The target for "right first time" delivery is 98 percent.
Local loop unbundling (LLU) is the process whereby competitors to BT are able to install their own equipment in BT's exchanges. This lets the operators manage their own lines and potentially offer a wider range of broadband services than can be bought wholesale from BT.
Openreach, BT's network operating arm, had promised to improve its delivery quality by September, and Black noted in his update that this had clearly been missed. He's now demanding action within three months.
"As I am sceptical of the assurances I have received over many months I have specifically requested a Performance Improvement Paper that will set out all the Improvement & Ongoing Stability Plans that will cover Plan & Build, Backhaul Delivery, BAU Unbundled Loop Delivery, EMP and Assurance (Repair) Performance," wrote Black on Friday.
Voicing fears that "unless concerted action is taken swiftly the LLU market will be put at a disadvantage", Black added that he required a "clear Staircase of Improvement Targets, each point on the staircase defined by Time and the Actions to be taken and the Resultant Improvement in Quality to be delivered".
A spokesperson for Openreach assured ZDNet UK that it was "committed to getting the performance for LLU on track" and was "working flat out to improve the issues" raised by the OTA. However, no specific details were available as to the cause of the problems.
On the positive side, Black also noted that problems with backhaul ("last-mile" connectivity) at co-mingling locations appeared to be improving. This issue was raised in his last update.
Openreach has an incentive to unbundle as many lines as possible, as it will be free to vary its pricing for different operators when a target of 1.5 million lines is reached, or half-way through 2007 — whichever comes first.
Talkback
I would like to record negative experience on several 'issues' on this subject. Having relocated from Greater Mancheter to Rugby in late June of this year I finally seem to have managed to get a resolution to problems getting a reliable ADSL connection at my new location.
The first problem was that although I wished to tranfer my Demon connection I was told this was 'not possible'. I was obliged to cancel my existing contract and then requisition a new one for the new location. Why is this a problem? Firstly because it is not possible to obtain continuing ADSL service throughout that period. The only way to deal with it is to temporarily set up an address that is close to your own, then when the old address has been closed, change the new address back to the old detail. This means that for some time - i.e. several days, emails are returned to the senders as being 'undelivered' though the reason why that is taking place is not revealed to them, nor is it evident to you that your mail is not arriving.
A second 'feature' is that BT are unhelpful in co-ordinating the cut-off (which they organise instantaneously), with the reinstallation (which is "sometime within the next ten days" when they finally get around to actioning the request.
When the request finally is actioned, however, BT (or, actually, it's new silly-named local support company) is highly reluctant to actually ensure the connection actually works. Worse than that, they will not action any request for an investigation into a non-working connection until that request is requested by your ISP (i.e. Demon in this case), the Demon technical support centre is in Bangalore, and BT does not work outside normal working hours. Furthermore, before BT will action a request they attempt to blackmail the user by threatening a £60 fee in the event that the fault is eventually traced to the user end of the connection. In my own case, I had a connection that appeared to work acceptably well during normal working hours but for some bizarre reason started to lose synchronisation at around 8.30 in the evening, such that by 9.30 it was virtually impossible to send or receive a message or to maintain a VPN. Until the technical support person in Bangalore could finally convince himself that there really was a synchronisation problem that was hardware-based at the BT exchange they refused to even raise a Fault Report to BT. The problem is that the line tests out OK, but that does not mean that the ADSL stays connected. Even sending a copy of the Router Log showing the dropping connection every few minutes didn't do the trick. Has BT managed to write a contract whereby they can bill the service provider if a fault is not found I wonder? Amazing, on the basis that BT is the contracted Service Delivery agent. Tail wagging dog in real terms.
So, three and half months on, the connection is finally working. No word of apology so far from BT for the fact that (1) the connection didn't work (2) they refused to look for a fault (3) they were to blame (4) they had no right whatsoever to blame me. Even if the fault HAD been at my end any good service provider should surely be willing to put in a little effort to help sort out the problem, but it appears that BT is still in sulk that it lost, or at least was supposed to lose, its monopoloy position. That was because the service was LOUSY you people - and what is worse is that it STILL IS LOUSY - and not only for contracted-out services. A friend and colleague has a BT ADSL contract and months after installation he is experiencing the same symptoms as I am. Guess what, BT's ADSL Service Support is provided from Bangalore as well. I am not suggesting that Indian support professionals are incompetent. I am firmly of the opinion that the incompetence is with BT itself, and care for the fact is completely absent.