BT Openreach Make it Cheap to Trial Faster “Fibre Broadband” Speeds

BTOpenreach has moved to “create incentives” for ISPs and their subscribers to change or trial a faster Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC) or Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) “fibre broadband” speed by launching a new special offer, which cuts the £11.25 Bandwidth Modification Charge to £0.

At present most of the ISPs that offer FTTC (VDSL) packages tend to promote Internet speeds from 40Mbps (2Mbps upload) and up to 80Mbps (20Mbps), while FTTP adds several tiers that go up to 330Mbps (30Mbps).

Most recently Openreach has also added a new 55Mbps FTTC product, but so far it hasn’t attracted much interest (here).

Openreach Statement

We are pleased to announce a six month special offer on the GEA Bandwidth Modification Charge. This will create incentives for our CPs and their end-customers to move bandwidths more easily as well as allowing their customers to trial a faster speed. The standard terms and conditions for GEA, as published on the Openreach website, will apply to the special offer.

One problem with this approach could be that ultrafast FTTP only has a very small UK footprint, while those able to get the full speed out of a 40Mbps FTTC product may feel little need to go faster (assuming their lines can actually deliver above 40Mbps and many cannot). The faster product tiers also tend to attract a slightly higher rental charge.

However if you are able to get above 40Mbps on FTTC then it’s certainly possible that the option of testing a faster speed could encourage some up-sell to faster tiers. Otherwise the new offer will be made available to ISPs from 2nd May until 1st November 2016, but it remains to be seen how many providers will take and offer it in the way that Openreach intend.