Devon and Somerset Scheme Say BT is 11K Premises Short of Broadband Target

The Connecting Devon and Somerset project has revealed that their Phase 1 roll-out of “superfast broadband” (24Mbps+) services with BT (Openreach) will miss its target by far more than the “circa 1,700 premises” that was claimed in December 2016; it has actually fallen short by c.11,000.

The CDS scheme recently announced a major new contract with Gigaclear that would bring a 1Gbps (1000Mbps+) capable Fibre-to-the-Premise (FTTP) broadband network to an additional 35,225 of the hardest to reach premises in the region by 2019 (here), but today’s news concerns the original Phase 1 aim of achieving 90% coverage (24Mbps+) by the end of 2016.

At the time of Gigaclear’s announcement we pointed out that the current level of “superfast” coverage between the two counties appeared to be sitting a few percentage points lower than 90%, with Thinkbroadband’s database suggesting 82% coverage of 24Mbps+ speeds in Devon and 84% in Somerset (note: the official figures tend to be +1-2% more optimistic, but we prefer TBB’s more cautious data).

This week Graham Long, Chairman of the B4RDS (Broadband for Rural Devon & Somerset) lobby group, pointed out to ISPreview.co.uk that the Devon County Council had received a progress update from CDS (here), which was originally put together before Christmas and has only now been published in written form. The update stated that “BT are predicting missing the Superfast Connection Target by a small number circa 1,700 premises. 99.5% of the contract will complete on time and the small number not achieved will be met by the end of March.”

However CDS’s Keri Denton has this week clarified, via a verbal update (skip forward to about 2:09:00) to the Place Scrutiny Committee (10th Jan 2017), that the above prediction was incorrect. “As you note from the report, we were predicting being able to close out the contract, with BT being about 1,700 superfast premises short. Despite BT’s reassurances unfortunately that figure has grown, very disappointingly, to 11,000 premises short at superfast speed.”

The good news is that CDS has exceeded the target for raw “fibre broadband” coverage (this includes sub-24Mbps speeds = 320,000 homes and businesses covered by the end of 2016) and meanwhile they’re “working closely with BT to produce an improved remedial plan and to mitigate against that impact on those 11,000 [24Mbps+] properties. Very disappointing.”

Apparently BT has already “caught up” by 1,000 premises since the end of December (i.e. they’re now 10,000 short), so it shouldn’t take long and the original expectation of completion by March 2017 might still be viable (not confirmed). This is good news for BT too because Keri Denton was quick to warn that “until BT have delivered what they set out to deliver then they don’t get paid, so that’s a bit of a lever.”

A CDS Spokesperson told ISPreview.co.uk:

“BT has informed CDS that phase one of the Connecting Devon & Somerset programme failed to achieve its contracted superfast broadband target by the end of 2016. BT has now predicted roll out will come to an end in March 2017 slightly beyond the original December 2016 target date. BT originally predicted that they would be some 1,700 premises short by the end of the contracted target date, unfortunately this short fall has increased to 11,000 premises.

This is very disappointing news given how close we were to meeting a very challenging target. We have sought assurances from BT to minimise the delay and impact and are currently discussing how best to bring this contract to a rapid conclusion. Once these discussion are concluded, CDS will advise residents, businesses and stakeholders of the plans.

This phase of the CDS Programme has faced some significant engineering challenges since it started in 2013, but it has succeeded in providing superfast services and improved speeds to 320,000 homes and businesses across Devon and Somerset. We now have 31.7% take up of the new services available through public funding support, transforming how we live our day to day lives, connect communities and run our businesses.”

Furthermore it’s clear from some of the councillors and their questions that there’s a lot of displeasure with BT. The CDS team similarly echoed that they’ve had “constant trouble with them“, but BT themselves remain upbeat and expect to finish in more positive territory, albeit perhaps a little later than expected.

A BT Spokesperson told ISPreview.co.uk:

“The Connecting Devon and Somerset (CDS) programme is a considerable success story.

It surpassed, ahead of schedule, the target of bringing fibre broadband to 320,000 homes and businesses by the end of 2016, whilst overcoming a variety of challenges – including the worst flooding in living memory. A small amount of residual work is being carried out early this year and when the remainder of this work is completed, we are confident that we will actually exceed the original superfast broadband target by several thousand premises.

Our formal progress update will be given to CDS later this month and the precise numbers have not yet been confirmed. We are working hard to make superfast broadband as widely available as possible as quickly as possible.”

Other Matters

Separately Keri Denton also promised to address some interesting concerns that were raised by residents of Combe Raleigh, which is a village in East Devon that was originally excluded from the earlier CDS roll-out because BT had factored it into their commercial superfast broadband roll-out programme (it’s still marked as such today on CDS’s website).

Unfortunately the information on CDS’s website appears to be incorrect and residents have complained that Openreach instead told them that they would need to “make a one off payment to BT of [£48,954]” (i.e. under the operator’s Community Fibre Partnership scheme) in order to benefit from an upgrade to faster broadband.

Locals point out that CDS must have been aware of this because “postcodes in the village were included in the Phase 2 [Open Market Review] conducted at the end of 2015.” Gigaclear last month won the related contract, but so far they have not included Combe Raleigh into their tentative roll-out plan.

Roll-out plans do change and we have seen similar situations in other Broadband Delivery UK supported contracts, where areas that were initially marked as “commercial” have later been dropped. On the flip side we’ve also seen BT reach new areas that they never expected to include, thus there’s always a bit of a yo-yo movement, but clearly the CDS programme team do need to clarify their plan for Combe Raleigh. In the meantime some locals have managed to get a voucher for a Satellite connection, but many have not.

Finally we should highlight a few of the other details that have been revealed by the latest CDS progress update.

CDS Progress Update – Highlights

* Much of the deployment that will be completed in the first quarter of 2017 is Fibre to the Premise (FTTP) and this requires numerous wayleaves and highways notifications which have in many instances been difficult for BT to obtain in the final stages of the contract.

* As reported to the Scrutiny meeting in November, Airband Community Internet, the fixed wireless supplier for Dartmoor and Exmoor National Parks, had been experiencing a number of issues hampering the rollout of wireless services across both Moors. Since then the CDS Programme Board has agreed a Remedial Plan which sets out the steps the provider intends to take to reach their target.

The plan shows how Airband intend to extend coverage to 3980 premises by the end of 2016, reaching their contractual target by the end of March 2017. Airband will also provide additional coverage to 1,000 premises across Dartmoor and Exmoor and these will be brought into the contract for the Moors through Change Control.

At the time of writing, Airband had made services available to over 3,000 properties across the National Parks. 65 masts currently have been installed across Dartmoor and Exmoor with 21 so far offering a service.

* One of the CDS lots for Phase 2 (in the Bath & North East Somerset area) is currently the subject of a legal challenge and this process needs to conclude before a contract may be awarded. NOTE: Gigaclear won lots 2 (North Coast), 3 (Eastern), 5 (Exm2sea) and 6 (South Moor). Meanwhile Lots 1 (Uppder CDS) and 4 (North Moor) have yet to be won by any bidders.