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[Alex Atkin UK]

I'm interested to see how prices compare to the likes of youfibre. Still paying £49 pcm for 2gb/2gb with fixed ip.

My understanding is it inherently can't be competitive due to OFCOM rules, specifically to allow alt-nets to be economically viable.

[dee.jay]

Yeah the OR and BTw checkers will show two different results because ultimately OR is offering 1.2 and 1.8 tiers to ISP's that want them but as of yet only EE is offering it over BTw.

I asked AA back in March and was told BTw were not selling the higher tiers yet, which smacks of anti competitiveness to me, but what do I know.

[j0hn]

My understanding is it inherently can't be competitive due to OFCOM rules, specifically to allow alt-nets to be economically viable.

Pretty much this.

There was a lot of push back on the Openreach Equinox 2 discount, which was just then lowering the wholesale price of their FTTP to providers.

Even that Equinox discount that was eventually approved keeps OR's wholesale price way above current Youfibre offerings.

It's very much regulated to keep the OR price high to allow others to compete.

[j0hn]

I asked AA back in March and was told BTw were not selling the higher tiers yet, which smacks of anti competitiveness to me, but what do I know.

Openreach weren't even selling it back in March, so BTw couldn't.
It was still in trial phase then with EE being the only provider to participate.

[dee.jay]

So, one assumes that this will change soon, then?

[Dwight]

So, one assumes that this will change soon, then?

News article on ISPreview about this. (27/04)
https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2024/04/broadband-isps-prep-fttp-plans-for-openreachs-1-2gbps-and-1-8gbps-tiers.html

[Alex Atkin UK]

This is frustrating, BT Wholesale seem to be the hold up on Zen rolling this out.

They haven't said so, but the BTW checker still says up to 1000 and its suspect that Zen are now offering these speeds to their wholesale customers (presumably via their own backhaul) but not their own retail customers.

[dee.jay]

Yep, Zen have unbundled 700 exchanges in the UK, so they are using a mixture of OR and BTW to reach everyone. They are not unbundled in my exchange so 900 is the best Zen can do for me

[j0hn]

They are not unbundled in my exchange so 900 is the best Zen can do for me

They aren't doing anything above 900Mb to their own retail customers regardless of the local exchange unbundling.
Zen are wholesaling this to other providers who use Zen backhaul.

Not sure why they aren't selling it retail yet. Seems odd to wait for BTw to start wholesaling as Zen have sold products regionally in the past.

[Alex Atkin UK]

Not sure why they aren't selling it retail yet. Seems odd to wait for BTw to start wholesaling as Zen have sold products regionally in the past.

I wonder if its a perception issue.  Going to look much better promotionally if they can offer it across the board at launch, rather than the relatively small (in comparison) CityFibre footprint.

I'm more curious why BTw are dragging their heels and EE somehow gets an exception.  That doesn't sound like following the Ofcom rules of no preferential treatment to the parent company.  They can hardly say its still a trial when they are making no such distinction when sending cold callers.

[j0hn]

There is/was no preferential treatment.
EE were the only provider who took up the (open to other providers) Openreach trial.

It's not uncommon that a provider can continue to sell a trial product in the time period between trial ending and a commercial launch.
They will likely be bound to the same terms & restrictions as they were during the trial was such as price, geographical restrictions and any cap/quota on signups.

[XGS_Is_On]

There is/was no preferential treatment.
EE were the only provider who took up the (open to other providers) Openreach trial.

I'm a little confused here. EE didn't take up anything from Openreach: BT Enterprise / Wholesale are providing them the service. 1.6 EE customers are going across the same cablelinks to the same MSEs as everyone else using those wholesale products.

Might be a chain of trials but getting a tad tenuous a chain given the Openreach product was launched months ago now. Making the most of the touch more flexibility wholesale has over Openreach.

[Alex Atkin UK]

I'm a little confused here. EE didn't take up anything from Openreach: BT Enterprise / Wholesale are providing them the service. 1.6 EE customers are going across the same cablelinks to the same MSEs as everyone else using those wholesale products.

Might be a chain of trials but getting a tad tenuous a chain given the Openreach product was launched months ago now. Making the most of the touch more flexibility wholesale has over Openreach.

Exactly.  They can call it a trial all they want, but indeed if it was true they are still signing people up to this (the sales rep at the door said nothing about a trial, just they could sell it to me) despite BTW not officially supporting it yet, this seems like abuse of their relationship with BTW and extremely anti-competitive.  Precisely what they aren't supposed to be doing.

[XGS_Is_On]

Just a little log kindly sent to me proving the point that this isn't some obscure EE trial with Openreach but the exact same MSE and IP ranges used by BT Consumer via BT Wholesale:

Sat Jul  6 20:38:09 2024 daemon.warn pppd[5644]: No CHAP secret found for authenticating us to acc-aln2.sc
Sat Jul  6 20:38:09 2024 daemon.info pppd[5644]: CHAP authentication succeeded: CHAP authentication success
Sat Jul  6 20:38:09 2024 daemon.notice pppd[5644]: CHAP authentication succeeded
Sat Jul  6 20:38:09 2024 daemon.notice pppd[5644]: peer from calling number 14:7B:AC:B3:23:5C authorized
<Snip>
Sat Jul  6 20:38:09 2024 daemon.notice netifd: Network device 'pppoe-wan' link is up
Sat Jul  6 20:38:09 2024 daemon.notice hostapd: wlan1: interface state HT_SCAN->ENABLED
Sat Jul  6 20:38:09 2024 daemon.notice hostapd: wlan1: AP-ENABLED
Sat Jul  6 20:38:09 2024 daemon.notice pppd[5644]: local  IP address 86.150.[redacted]

Name:    acc-aln2.sc.21cn-infra.bt.net
Address:  213.1.163.176

BT Wholesale MSE 2 in Scarborough - this takes the cablelink from Huawei OLT BAADMT and likely newer ones too. Upgrade of original MSE chassis for capacity.

MAC proves out it's a Nokia 7750 MSE:

Company   Nokia
OUI   14-7B-AC
MAC range   14-7B-AC-00-00-00 - 14-7B-AC-FF-FF-FF

IP address issued is:

Name:    host86-150-x-y.range86-150.btcentralplus.com
Address:  86.150.x.y

inetnum:        86.148.0.0 - 86.159.255.255
remarks:        *******************************************************************
remarks:        * Report abuse via: http://bt.custhelp.com/app/contact/c/346,3024 *
remarks:        *******************************************************************
netname:        BT-CENTRAL-PLUS
descr:          IP pools
<snip>
role:           BT CENTRAL PLUS - OPERATIONAL SUPPORT
remarks:        *******************************************************************
remarks:        * Report abuse via: http://bt.custhelp.com/app/contact/c/346,3024 *
remarks:        *******************************************************************
address:        BT
address:        Wholesale

Not a big deal in the grand scheme, the product isn't exactly astonishing and few folks would be interested I imagine, but certainly they're testing the limits a bit.

[Alex Atkin UK]

I feel its still a big deal if EE are monopolising those speeds due to somehow having a special deal with BTW, even if people taking those speeds are a small market (and need to be in order for contention to not become a problem).