Watchdog slams BT over broadband repairs

 

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By Stuart Turton

Posted on 8 Oct 2007 at 13:33

BT Openreach is still failing to hit repair targets on unbundled broadband lines, the Office of the Telecommunications Adjudicator reveals.

In his September update, Peter Black, executive chairman of the watchdog, notes that, while the UK has hit a "significant milestone" in unbundling 3.195 million lines, "the underlying failure rate for mainstream repair performance continues at an unacceptably high level (15-25%), substantially short of agreed targets."

"Getting the right person, to the right place at the right time is one of the most difficult things to do and it [Openreach] was starting from a low base," Peter Black tells PC Pro.

"There's plans afoot to fix things. BT's shown us those plans and though I would have liked something to have happened by now, we're hoping to see progress [targets met] by the middle of next year."

Black calls current Openreach service levels a "plateau" which will require focus from the company to hit the agreed target levels.

However, the adjudicator also notes the Right First Time delivery figure, which measures whether customers are getting the service they were promised at the point of sale, has improved a couple of percent from August, rising to 94%, though still some way under the industry target of 98%.

"We would all like to see those levels improve and maybe things are not improving as quickly as we would have liked," says a BT spokesperson. "But there's a huge amount of work going on. We're confident things will get better."

Local loop unbundling is the process which allows BT's competitors to install their own equipment in its exchanges, affording them the opportunity to manage their own lines and offer new services. Companies including Sky, Tiscali and Orange have all invested heavily in LLU, which has seen UK broadband subscriptions soar.