Openreach Urge Action from UK ISPs as Pilot Exchange Closures Draw Near
Openreach (BT) has warned broadband and phone providers impacted by three of their pilot UK exchange closures – Deddington, Ballyclare and Kenton Road – that they only have c.90 days left to identify their risk cohorts (e.g. telecare customers) and migrate them. The network operator said they were growing “increasingly concerned” about the pressure on their resources from ISPs leaving it too late.
In case anybody has forgotten. Openreach currently operates around 5,600 UK exchanges, but only c. 1,000 of those are used to provide nationwide coverage of modern “fibre broadband” based services (FTTC, FTTP etc.) – the Openreach Handover Points (OHPs). However, the rollout of full fibre (FTTP), combined with the retirement of copper lines and legacy services (ADSL, WLR etc.), will make it economically unviable to support both the old and new exchanges.
The operator thus has a long-term plan for closing the other 4,600 exchanges – known as the Exchange Exit Programme, which starts with their initial pilot of 3 exchanges (see above) and then extends to an initial closure of 105 “priority exchanges” by 2030, with the rest gradually following through the early 2030s.
Advertisement
However, closing an exchange and migrating affected customers is a highly complex process, which typically takes around 4-7 years (depending upon the complexity of each exchange) – starting with a Stop Sell of old products and eventually ending with everything being switched off (Openreach and ISPs then remove their physical equipment over the remaining months).
The three pilot exchanges have already been in this process for a while, with Deddington (covers 1,200 premises) due to reach the final product switch-off on 28th November 2025, while the much larger Ballyclare (9,500 premises) and Kenton Road (9,500 premises) exchanges will reach this point just two days later (aka – Network Cease Date). There may be some exceptions to this date for Deddington.
What’s the problem?
As the deadline nears, Openreach have said they’re growing “increasingly concerned” that receiving orders for the full remaining volume over this reduced timescale may “challenge their available resources” (including engineering, civils etc), especially considering the volume of complex services still live at the pilot exchanges.
The operator is thus calling on communication providers to “urgently work to identify their risk cohorts asap” (Telecare, CNI/Complex, 2 stage FTTP provisions etc.) and share their plans for tackling them with Openreach before 12th September 2025. This is because related customers are expected to have longer than average lead times and orders must thus be placed by mid-September “at the latest” to allow enough time to tackle them before the final switch-off.
Advertisement
The situation is even more urgent for providers with Ethernet (EAD) circuits that still need to shift/cease, which really need to be tackled right now in other to avoid running into the final network cease. Similarly, any ISP that may be planning to use the bulk FTTP broadband ordering process must consider that it has a minimum 6-week lead time (i.e. these must already be underway or there could be issues).
The clear risk here is that some providers are in danger of leaving things so late that their customers could run the risk of being disconnected. “[Providers] who are non-responsive to these points and not actively sharing plans with Openreach should expect that they will see all remaining services being ceased from 1 December 2025, this will include any services with in-flight orders with a CCD that exceeds 30 November 2025“, said the operator. On top of this, providers that have signed up to the Openreach Exchange Exit commercial contract may have compensation withheld if they fail to migrate every line in their base prior to the final exit date.
At this point such issues aren’t too much of a cause for wider concern because Openreach’s pilot only impacts three relatively small exchanges. But the operator won’t want to see this situation repeated when it comes to expanding the process across hundreds and thousands of exchanges in the future, which would risk creating a nightmare scenario for their UK engineering etc. resources.
However, we should keep in mind that the purpose of any trial or pilot is to test and understand things like this, so the hope is that the learnings Openreach and ISPs take away from it will make future closures much less challenging. The first ones are always the hardest. But equally it might just be possible that it ends up taking the network operator a lot longer to shut their old exchanges down then they would have liked.
Advertisement
The alternative would risk a mass of unwanted customer disconnections, which nobody wants to see, especially as it could then turn it into more of a political issue.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
« VIDEO – Altnet UK Broadband ISP Quickline Launches Rare TV Ad Campaign
Advertisement
Leave a Reply
Privacy Notice: Please note that news comments are anonymous, which means that we do NOT require you to enter any real personal details to post a message and display names can be almost anything you like (provided they do not contain offensive language or impersonate a real persons legal name). By clicking to submit a post you agree to storing your entries for comment content, display name, IP and email in our database, for as long as the post remains live.
Only the submitted name and comment will be displayed in public, while the rest will be kept private (we will never share this outside of ISPreview, regardless of whether the data is real or fake). This comment system uses submitted IP, email and website address data to spot abuse and spammers. All data is transferred via an encrypted (https secure) session.
I imagine there could be more than a few ISPs (and telecare providers) shocked to discover that they’ve run out of road and can’t kick the can down it anymore.
I would imagine that Ofcom would step in to prevent disconnections once the program is in full swing, but I wonder if Ofcom would be prepared to fund Openreach to perform an extension to the operational life of the heritage infrastructure in such a scenario?
There’s no need. Customers at risk of disconnection will just move to equivalent services provided on a modern network. Extending the life of legacy networks does no-one any favours.
@ 125us:
The article is about scenarios where customers’ providers are not ensuring that the migration will happen within the planned timescales.
It’s not just a technology problem. I can’t imagine Ofcom would want to pay Openreach to pay Telereal a small fortune to keep the leases on these exchanges alive.
@Steve:
I know it is not just a technical problem.
The point i was making regarding the potential scenario of Ofcom obliging BT to keep exchanges operational beyond proposed shutdown dates. If Ofcom is not prepared to pay up, why should BT take the hit?
All those that piled-in when the local loop was unbundled 25 years ago and either haven’t bothered or unable to invest and move on. A bit parastic really.
Plenty of warnings have been given, over an extended period of time, still, wouldn’t be surprised to see a delay, as they will want to see these first three close with minimum of problems.
,
I would hedge bets that most of those customers don’t know anything about it and will just be disconnected without warning. This is why OFCOM should allow Openreach to directly communicate with impacted customers
Most ISP’s are just dragproper phase out prograsmkging their herels and doing nothing. IT really needs a proper phase out program,
These pilip ppear to show that just leaving it to the ISP;s to act is not working
Would be a good idea to read over before posting. 🙂
Beep boop beep
The fingers you have used to type are too fat.
To obtain a special typing wand, please mash the keyboard with your palm now.
Exchange closures should be limited to areas whereby they are 100% fibre
That way there is absolutely no chance of any circuits being left behind
It would also surely incentivise open reach to complete fibre rollout in particularly rural areas where they wish to offload exchanges
Availability isn’t the issue. No ability for Openreach to forcibly migrate people at the moment, relies on their service provider. Service provider sits on their hands end user’s service abruptly ends.
As Polish Poler says, this is the issue.
in my area full fibre is fully present but a stubborn management company refuses to let them in. Is till have no clue why. Except their ‘official reason’ which is “the fibre in the street is built for SDU’s only and does not work in MDU’s. and until OR install MDU fibre in the street then they will cooperate” (basically a simplistic translation of the complex wording what was written) – lunacy at best.
Local exchange closure mostly does not depend on fibre (FTTP) rollout. FTTC (copper to street cabinets) will continue to work; those cabinets are connected by fibre to larger, head-end exchanges which aren’t closing.
What’s necessary is:
1. get people off exchange-based ADSL; move them to either FTTC or FTTP.
2. get people off analogue voice; move them to digital voice (again FTTC or FTTP is fine)
3. get other users of the local exchange out (e.g. EAD leased lines, LLU operators, altnets)
Point (1) does require a solution for the relatively small proportion of properties on EO lines. I would presume that for the trial exchanges, OR have either rerouted them all to FTTC cabinets or made FTTP available.
The Exchange Exit Program is not constrained by any requirement for all premises to be connected via fibre.
There’s no reason to do that. FTTC has no copper back to the exchange once the PSTN has closed, which happens sooner than the exchange closures.
Its clear what the solution is, Let Openreach bypass the retail ISP and any intermediate wholesalers to deal with it directly with the end users. Ofcom just need to get out of that isolate each partner mindset.
How would that work?
Personally I think the trial is a good way to find out the problems migrating to the new infrastructure. After unbundling,
ISP’s seem to have been allowed to put their services on Openreach’s plant without keeping Openreach up to date with what is passing over their wires or glass. Hence the confusion. ISP’s, especially those working on shoestring budgets, probably don’t want to spend money on migration (unless forced to) as their investors will look at the loss on their returns. Also laziness, quick fix patches, slipshod documentation will have it’s effect. Then there is the issue of third party equipment (e.g. telecare devices) at consumer’s premises which will have been largely ignored.
I hope Openreach will learn of the difficulties of migration (and there will be some) from the trial and make suitable mandate to carried ISP’s that they shall:-
Contact end users in good time to establish attached non-compliant devices – if possible.
Provide Openreach with a checklist of non-compliant services and hard to migrate services.
But then this is from someone who has migrated all services (telephony was a bit of a problem with the router setup) to a third party ISP over Openreach’s fibre – I’m probably being ‘holier than thou’! 🙂
“The operator is thus calling on communication problems[sic] to “urgently work to identify their risk cohorts asap””
Should that be:
“Communication Providers”?
It should 🙂
Keep the exchange open for the providers who don’t shift their customers and fine them £10 a day for each line not ceased. Double the daily fine the month after and repeat each month, pretty quickly they’ll shift the customers.
BT has its own contractual deadlines for the closures of many exchanges. Keeping them operational beyond individual target dates would be a very expensive option.
Which? has recently publicised the fact that some telecare providers are still selling PSTN-only devices. Why has Ofcom allowed this?