Openreach Increases Wholesale Ethernet Prices for UK ISPs

Openreach (BT) has today announced large price increases across their various high-capacity Ethernet (EBD, EAD etc.) products and Excess Construction Charges (ECC) for UK ISPs, which are all due to be introduced from April 2023. The changes also help to position their 1Gb services as the new entry-level products.

Under Ofcom’s most recent Wholesale Fixed Telecom Market Review (WFTMR), as published in 2021 (here), Openreach is allowed to increase prices across their various Ethernet solutions by the CPI level of inflation (11.1% in this case). The changes being announced today, across their Ethernet products (including Optical mainlink), as well as some ECCs and Access Locate Accommodation charges, largely reflect this.

Openreach informs us that the increases have also been focussed on lower bandwidth products, which is partly to help position 1Gb services as the entry-level products. On top of that, they’ve also announced the renewal of two existing, as well as the launch of four new, special offers for EAD 1Gb and EAD 10Gb services to make these high bandwidth products more attractive.

“These special offers include reduced connection pricing, the ability to spread connection charges over a three year period, and free remote upgrades to 1Gb from 10Mb or 100Mb,” said a spokesperson for Openreach. The price changes and offers themselves are too numerous to easily summarise, but you can find more details here, here, here and here.