Kitz Forum
Announcements => News Articles => Topic started by: Bowdon on June 21, 2018, 10:55:49 AM
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https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2018/06/ofcom-deregulate-more-uk-broadband-and-tighten-rules-for-kcom.html (https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2018/06/ofcom-deregulate-more-uk-broadband-and-tighten-rules-for-kcom.html)
uk map green broadband telecoms britain
After a bit of a delay Ofcom has today published the draft outcome of their latest Wholesale Broadband Access (WBA) market review, which among other things imposes some new rules upon KCOM in Hull (East Yorkshire) and relaxes regulation across more of the UK due to rising competition between ISPs.
At present Ofcom tends to filter each part of the United Kingdom into three categories (markets), which defines which areas need more regulation to protect consumers (Market A) and which can benefit from softer regulation due to rising competition (Market B). This is important, not least because it can affect how much some of you pay for your broadband and phone services.
Generally speaking BT (Openreach) is only considered to have Significant Market Power (SMP) for the wholesale broadband market in a small part of the United Kingdom (Market A), while KCOM is viewed the same for the Hull area and has its own definition. Outside of these areas there’s usually enough competition from rival ISPs and networks for Ofcom to deregulate certain services.
Until today the current market definitions, which were last updated during 2014, were set as follows. We’ve also added the new definitions to show how they’ve changed.
Current UK Market Definitions
Market A (2014)
Exchange areas where there are only one or two potential significant wholesale broadband providers present or forecast to be present (e.g. BT), which accounts for 9.5% of UK premises in mostly rural areas.
Market A (2018)
Now accounts for 0.9% of UK premises.
Market B (2014)
Exchange areas where there are three or more primary operators present or forecast to be present (Sky Broadband, TalkTalk, BT, Virgin Media etc.), accounting for 89.8% of premises.
Market B (2018)
Now accounts for 98.5% of UK premises.
Hull Area (2014)
Covers 0.7% of UK premises, where KCOM is the only significant provider.
Hull Area (2018)
Unchanged.
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The summaries always seem to mention the changes in the sizes of the Market A and Market B areas, but fail to mention that there will no longer be any charge controls in Market A.