Sky calls for Ofcom investigation into UK's broadband marketplace

[Tabbykatze]

The best thing about Openreach is that both companies can have plausible deniability over the other. Here's a real world example that is costing a business money, lots of money:
Call up early March to open a business broadband line to the shop with an extra feature line and 2 phone lines. This will allow the company to operate it's web business which is where a lot of the business is forecasted to be. Upfront, a bond is paid and the initial subscribers feeand all is fine and dandy. 4 months later and these are the results:
-Nothing has been installed
-3 visits just to check the viability, not install, not route cable, just to check
-4 visits that were meant to occur to INSTALL the lines and failed because they could not gain access to a shop that is open 9-5 on top of that the business owners will have been in since 7 because they know what BT is like. They didn't ring the store, they didn't try to find the store and they pretty much just wanted an extra lunchbreak so just blew them off.
-No recompense for the ridiculous wait time (sorry, one months line rental on just a single line free)
-A variety of other things that have led to an incredibly hampered startup for the shop

And you know what, there is absolutely fanny adams that the business owners can do. BT don't take responsibility and neither do Openreach. It's an absolute farce. Commercially they've been horrendous in all but one of my experiences and colleagues.

If Openreach was a separate company and not layered into a subsidiary with BT as it is now then it would be a good thing.

[peterb]

Are you a BT shill or just ignorant of the current situation?

And we'll stop that line of comment now, thank you.

[B] "whinge" is that upon privatisation BT was not only granted a taxpayer funded national phone line infrastructure they were also granted a legal monopoly over that infrastructure. The cost to Sky to replicate that infrastructure would cost billions. Then there's the issue of getting all the planning permission from local councils to dig up roads and cause disruptions.

Sky is "whining" that they should be given access to this largely tax funded infrastructure to install their cabling and exchanges in a cost effective manner that increases consumer choice.

BTs privatisation meant that ownership changed from the government, who under-invested in BT - or the GPO as it was - for years. BT's de- nationalisation unlocked the investment funds that allowed the upgrade from electromechanical exchanges to to electronic, and the subsequent investment in the fibre backbone.

BTs profits don't just sit in a bank account, they are distributed back to the owners of the business, the shareholders, many of which are institutional pension funds, so if you have a private pension fund, the chances are you are indirectly one of the owners of BT.

Openreach was set up to provide a company structure that provided the same trading terms to other service providers as that afforded to BT retail and BT wholesale. Spinning it off as a separate independent company might be a good idea, but the last thing it needs is to be nationalised. Government ownership might be good at kickstarting risky or new technology companies, but tends to be poor at managing established businesses.

[tomthum]

yeah the service in rural areas is total crap,
Gatehead/Kilmarnock/ Ayrshire/ a 2.5meg service if your lucky TOTAL CRAP

[aidanjt]

but tends to be poor at managing established businesses.

Only because they're run by politicians who're ideologically fixated on neoliberalism/privatisation, and they go about proving that government is useless at managing businesses by being useless.

[peterb]

Only because they're run by politicians who're ideologically fixated on neoliberalism/privatisation, and they go about proving that government is useless at managing businesses by being useless.

Governments of all political persuasions tend to be poor at managing nationalised industries because the overall management policy is set by politicians who are ideologically motivated - rather than based on what is good for the business.

BT and the railways suffered from chromic under investment for decades under both Labour and Conservative governments.

[edzieba]

Government ownership might be good at kickstarting risky or new technology companies, but tends to be poor at managing established businesses.

On the other hand, when it comes to national infrastructure privatisation generally seems to turn out worse than government operation. And the broadband network is approaching (if not already is) a piece of vital national infrastructure. At the very least it probably needs to be a non-profit entity rather than a for-profit company, even if not nationally owned.

[peterb]

On the other hand, when it comes to national infrastructure privatisation generally seems to turn out worse than government operation. And the broadband network is approaching (if not already is) a piece of vital national infrastructure. At the very least it probably needs to be a non-profit entity rather than a for-profit company, even if not nationally owned.

That is true - up to a point. But National infrastructure isn't static, and the danger is that Governments don't continue the investment to make sure it misfit for purpose for changing needs. One reason why the old GPO/telephony system started creaking at the edges.

A business has to respond to changing need to survive, so they are more responsive - the danger is that they tend to follow the more profitable routes. At least as a controlled monopoly, BT has some incentive to provide services to non-profitable areas (which means that non-profitable areas are being subsidised by the rest).

To get back on topic, Sky wants to reap the rewards of the existing infrastructure without the investment. They could partake in LLU, which would potentially give them a competitive edge, but at a relatively long return on investment.

[BobF64]

Sky is "whining" that they should be given access to this largely tax funded infrastructure to install their cabling and exchanges in a cost effective manner that increases consumer choice.

And even when given access to things, at what you'd have to assume is a fair commercial rate since Ofcom keep getting involved, they still seem to want to provide services via BT/Openreach infrastructure, only installing their own hardware where they can make profit, ignoring anything that makes them a loss.

This leaves BT/Openreach installing and upgrading almost all the network everywhere else, then others making use of it at a low rate.

Would you want to spend money furnishing your home with lavish fittings only to be required to share it with people forced on you, where they only give you a tiny rent?

Free market economics and consumer choice only comes from investment, if you ride on someone elses wave, you sometimes get knocked off.