Gov Asks UK Broadband ISPs to Offer 8 Hours of Battery Backup
The UK Government’s Minister for Telecoms, Sir Chris Bryant, has written a new letter to the bosses of major broadband ISPs that calls on them to help protect vulnerable users during the switchover from analogue (PSTN) to digital (IP) phone solutions by refraining from re-starting non-voluntary migrations and offering battery backup that can last “up to” 8 hours.
The shift to digital phones is an industry, not government, led programme that is partly driven by the looming retirement of copper lines in favour of full fibre (FTTP). Not to mention that modern mobile and Internet Protocol (IP)-based communication services have largely taken over from traditional home phones, and it’s become harder to find parts for the old network.
Just to recap. The plan to switch-off older phone lines was recently delayed by BT to 31st January 2027 in order to give internet and phone providers, as well as telecare providers and consumers more time to adapt (details). But the main focus of this delay was on the 1.8 million people who use vital home telecare systems in the UK (e.g. elderly, disabled, and vulnerable people), which often aren’t compatible with the replacement VoIP / IP-based digital phone services (i.e. for everybody else the deadline is still technically Dec 2025).
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One of the other challenges with modern digital phone lines is that they can’t be remotely powered from the exchange (e.g. electricity can’t flow down optical fibre cables, like it could with copper), which means that vulnerable users often need some degree of battery backup within their homes to help keep the service in operation during a power outage.
Ofcom’s current minimum requirement is that such backup systems, when supplied to vulnerable users, must be able to power the above kit for “at least an hour” if there’s a power cut. Suffice to say that longer outages, which are more likely to occur in rural areas, can be problematic.
However, Sir Chris Bryant’s new letter – as seen by ISPreview, which was addressed to Ofcom, TechUK and the bosses of TalkTalk, BT (EE), Openreach, KCOM, Vodafone, Virgin Media (O2), Zen Internet, Sky Broadband and INCA, has just encouraged internet and phone providers to propose a “clear plan for moving to best-in-class battery backup solutions, lasting up to eight hours.”
Sir Chris Bryant said:
“Finally, we discussed the battery back-up solutions you provide to vulnerable customers. I appreciate the levels of collaboration that you are all showing on this, but across the industry there is still a large difference in service provided, ranging from sixty minutes of power resilience to up to eight hours.
I am particularly concerned by this as customers in rural areas without good mobile signal are also the most likely to suffer long power outages. Therefore I would like you all to write to me by the end of September with a clear plan for moving to best-in-class battery backup solutions, lasting up to eight hours.”
The big obstacle here is likely to be one of cost (battery backup options). For example, BT and EE currently offer an inclusive Battery Backup Unit (BBU) to very vulnerable customers, but for everybody else who wants one they’ll charge you £85. BT plans to launch an Advanced Battery Backup Unit (ABBU) “later this year“, which they claim will be able to “last for the full duration of most power outages“ (here), but it’s unclear if this will stretch to 8 hours.
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However, it hopefully goes without saying that a BBU capable of lasting 8 hours is likely to be very expensive (hundreds of pounds), which creates a risk that more providers (particularly smaller players) may see this as an incentive NOT to offer any digital phone services to vulnerable users (some already seem to take this approach).
The focus above is clearly on the end-user (service) side, rather than the network side, although the two are ultimately linked. Ofcom recently explored (here and here) whether to require fixed broadband providers to ensure their active street cabinets could support a 4-hour power backup (many already can). But in the end they acknowledged that this would be a very costly upgrade and instead adopted a softer recommendation that encouraged “power backup of approximately four hours to be good practice” (here).
Clearly Ofcom’s approach does not directly seem to align with the Government’s call for backup solutions that can last “up to 8 hours“, but then the term “up to” is one that could be considered widely open to interpretation. Ofcom are separately still consulting on the issue of introducing 1 hour of battery backup for mobile (radio) sites, but so far, they seem to have rejected that idea as being too expensive.
In addition, it’s worth pointing out that BT and Openreach are currently testing an additional (SOTAP for Analogue) phone line product that does NOT require a broadband connection to function, is powered (no need for battery backup) and will be targeted at vulnerable and edge use cases (inc. CNI) users – those with old analogue phone lines who would otherwise “face challenges” in migrating to IP based voice solutions by 2025. The solution, once introduced, would not be available for new service provisions (only existing customers) and is intended to be a temporary product (possibly running until around 2030).
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Finally, Sir Chris Bryant’s letter also touched on the issue of non-voluntary migrations. Under the existing charter that was established to help protect vulnerable home phone users (here), both the Government and ISPs agreed “to not forcibly move customers onto the new [digital phone] network unless they are fully confident they will be protected.” The charter also pledged that no telecare users would be migrated to digital landline services without the provider, customer, or telecare company first confirming they have a compatible and functioning telecare solution in place.
Sir Chris Bryant said:
I also look forward to seeing the launch of the industry-funded national comms campaign aimed at encouraging telecare users (and their carers) to register their needs. For those using Openreach networks, I am interested in updates on progress of the media gateway product and the “prove telecare” trial process.
Because there is more to do, I am asking you to refrain from re-starting non-voluntary migrations for the rest of this calendar year. Safety must be our top priority, and I want to test that we have done all we can to avoid anyone further coming to harm as a result of this process.
Within this, I am content with non-voluntary migrations that specifically target users that haven’t used their landline in more than 12 months, as was previously the case. These customers are not ‘landline-users’ by common understanding. I urge you to take all possible steps to exclude any telecare users from being migrated via this route.
This change is somewhat less contentious than the proposed battery backup one above and isn’t likely to draw much disagreement. We should add that Virgin Media has also recently established a new agreement with TSA, the telecare advisory body, to enhance the support provided to telecare users as the UK transitions to Digital Voice (here) – this is roughly similar to Openreach’s Prove Telecare trial.
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 and Linkedin.
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Great idea and essential when everyone’s using their internet connections for telephone communications.
But obviously it’ll be the consumers that’ll be paying for it.
I look at this and it strikes me immediately that the government are expecting power outages of at least 8 hours to occur soon. Net zero consequences again?
No, it just so happens that some people live in the sticks where the pace of life is a bit slower.
So a few hours of no power when a tree falls onto the only power line isn’t fixed by triggering a few breakers.
Who’s responsible for the maintenance/upkeep of the UPS units? The batteries are a consumable that need replacing every 3-5 years if they are expecting to maintain the rated “up to” battery life.
I’m surprised these “home telecare systems” don’t already have cellular modems with multiple sims setup with failover like most higher end security systems do. Removes any need for the user to actually maintain an active internet connection at all.
Telecare systems which use 2G/4G and have a multioperator SIM and a short backup battery are readily available already. Doro makes a unit.
Lithium on a small router would be fine.
Keep it to below 4.1v and it will last a decade without much issue.
I’m not sure laying this all at the feet of the ISP is defendable just because the phone line used to have power on it. Is a vulnerable person having all their needs taken care of because they have a working telephone plugged into a box downstairs, or does their care alarm need battery back-up? What about emergency lighting in their house?
By all means have ISPs give people the option of buying a UPS if they want, but eight hours seems an arbitrary number when the majority of power cuts are significantly shorter and eight hours of backup is no use if your emergency happens in hour eleven. Power outages in my view are an issue for the electricity companies to solve, and the availability of mobile networks in a power loss are between the MNOs, their power suppliers, and Ofcom. The discussion around keeping a telephone working has only come about because it’s what used to keep working in a power cut, and people have decided to focus on that rather than the bigger picture.
I can’t see many ISPs being willing to provide and support battery systems for the duration of someone’s contract and can see them offering a ‘landline’ service instead that is a mobile app with their old number linked to it, and a lot of disclaimers about how it shouldn’t be used for emergency calling.
quite. apparently we managed to survive years of people plonking mains-powered DECT handsets on their “rock solid reliability” POTS lines and ignoring advice to keep a corded phone around for emergencies.
Now that’s gone and we’re supposed to pretend that this is the biggest issue ever.
This is interesting, as I work in energy storage. I imagine that for things like exchanges and mobile towers, low cost is the priority (so things like flow batteries could be looked at in future). For street cabinets, space is the constraint, so I guess this means lithium-ion batteries.
At home, it’s tricky since the equipment may be in different places around the property (ONT, router, DECT phone base) Total load could be 25-35W, which is low, although it would be even lower if the kit could be integrated into a single unit (probably not realistic as the ONT serves as a ‘boundary point’?). UPSes are tricky as lead batteries don’t last long and lithium batteries are more costly.
This will be an interesting one to follow.
Exchanges have generators, so most operators deploy ~18-35 Mins of run time battery cover, switchover actually usually takes much longer than you would expect, 4-9 Mins typically. For context in datacentres we try and work to under 60s from power loss to generator taking the full load.
8 hours in a cabinet will be a bit painful for some “fly by night” operators who didn’t allow space for it, remember in winter after the batteries are a few years old capacity will be lower than what you designed for. In Cabs mostly SLA batts are used, but I know operators using VRF, and one using LiFe-Po4.
This 8 Hours especially sucks for operators using cabs with AE and those using cabs with AC kit. Double pain if you are someone like B4rn who use both! Though at least they have very big cabs, so probably is enough space.
Very few exchanges now have generators. If there is an extended power but they bring in a mobile generator
No, all OHP (FTTC/FTTP) exchanges have generators, only some rural/rural-ish POTS/ADSL only exchanges which don’t have gens.
Would it not be cheaper and easier to just offer a mobile phone / big button etc with a dock always plugged in and a SIM that has national roaming?
It should solve the issue of emergency calls in a power cut as the phone mast just needs the backup power.
We don’t have any mobile coverage at home, even the OpenReach engineers have to drive down the road to talk to their head office. We do have gigabit fibre, so we’re not that far out of the way – Mobile coverage is just that far behind.
A DECT base unit with built-in battery and 4G embedded sim would be a good option.
I guess there isn’t any technical reason BT/EE couldn’t assign a landline number to sim card?
No technical reason, but the letter specifically draws out the case where the end user may not have mobile coverage. Also mobile masts typically have well under a hour battery backup.
I have lost count of how many times by told me that the changeover was a government directive rather than instigated and to the benefit of the telecoms industry
Dueto the constant repeat of that message and my need to get pretty officious and knowledgeable (which I can do due to my background) I am sure that by is telling their staff this lie to repeat to customers
And as for the hold off of migration for certain customers it was the classic agreement until the next call when everything was denied
At the least as a parish councillor may I suggest at least one battery backed up phone per street to use for emergencies? ( Though of course the 999 people are also moving to the mobile network so won’t be contactable either!)
It is ‘industry lead’ insomuch as it is their idea, but one which is only being enacted with full Ofcom consent/approval. Of course, the veracity of the statement that it is impossible to have full fibre and PSTN co-existing is open to no small debate, as is the claim that BT are struggling to source/afford replacement parts.
Of course you could maintain two networks, but the business case for doing so does not stack up (and those who demand it don’t seem to want to pay for it). People don’t want landline phones anymore, whether its copper based or not.
As for PSTN reliability – what’s debatable about it? The youngest equipment is reaching 30 years old, the oldest is in its 40s. One of its manufacturers doesn’t exist anymore, and the other would probably prefer to cease support. Virgin has even more of a problem there as other defunct manufacturers are involved – and how much battery backup did it have anyway.
That’s why there’s this “SOTAP for analogue” thing which uses modern equipment, but clearly that approach does not scale beyond the handful of users per exchange.
Not really for ‘the benefit of the telecoms industry’.
The youngest exchange in the network is 26 years old. Many are over 40 years old. No-one makes circuit switched telephony kit that’s scalable to a national public network, and they haven’t done for a couple of decades.
The choice is to close the PSTN in a controlled, managed fashion, or risk it closing itself, permanently when something vital fails and can’t be repaired.
The party who benefits is the British public – they’ll get a supported, maintainable telephone network.
I know for a fact that BT wanted to bring in fibre in the 80’s under Margret but she said no. Shame.
That whole story really deserves a book.
You wouldn’t believe what BT had in the tech demo room which we could have had decades ago.
@Dave Webster
Often repeated, it’s complete horsepoo though. BT was famously a private company thanks to Maggie herself. Nothing in the Hansard, no legislation exists. BT sold the fibre manufacturing to Fujitsu as they’re a telecoms company, not a manufacturer of networking equipment.
My local OFNL install in the village exchange only has about an hour of UPS, and isn’t generator backed like the OR infrastructure, so although the homes on the estate could have 8 hours under this proposal, the exchange would be down.
(source: OFNL engineer who was running around like a blue-arsed fly when a power cut downed the infrastructure he was working on.)
Living in a rural area I can only agree with the requirement for UPS for disabled customers. However the need for a mobile signal is assessed by “ generality” not actuality. I supposedly live in an area with a good mobile signal and am supposedly able to receive one inside my house. This is true if I go to an upstairs room and hang out of the window, thus my mobile reception inside is entirely based on WiFi Calling. No amount of explaining this to a “technical” expert, ( I use the term reluctantly), would give me access to a UPS even if I offered to pay them for and certainly not sufficient to power all the discs required to enable “complete Wi-Fi” Politicians and telecommunications people plead the case for rural folk, it’s clear none of them have a clue what living in the countryside is really like. I fail to understand why there is not more information and encouragement to use Satellite systems in rural areas.
Why not just buy your own UPS?
This is the argument a lot of people are making here. If the connectivity is crucial for you, why is it the responsibility of the telecom company to give you a battery?
I am “rural folk” in that I grew up in a rural area (and, to add relevance, was literally one of the last places to get ADSL back in the day). In that area the power is so reliable that a UPS battery is more likely to die of old age before it gets a few discharge cycles on it.
As has been said, there’s nothing stopping you self-providing a power backup facility. You use the terms “disc” and “complete wifi”. Are you a BT customer? Why aren’t you taking digital voice and (if you are vulnerable) you’ll get a UPS from them to power the router/ONT only.
Satellite? The power draw on that is ridiculous…
I think that non-tech people won’t know what a UPS is, what to buy etc. I think personally what needs to happen is;
-ISP does 8+ Hours battery in cabinet.
-ISP offers every consumer to buy a UPS that has appropriate spec to run the CP provided ONT/Router for 8+ hours, the customer pays for that separately – if it’s £50 it’s £50 *but* the ISP provides it “at cost” and at the point of supply e.g it can go in the same postage box as the CPE.
This strikes a fair balance of the ISP not having to pay for UPS for any customers, but is making an effort to provide an easy option for them to buy.
I have battery backup at home, but the FTTC cabinet I’m on only lasts 3.5 hours, so every time we have power outage longer than that I lose all connectivity, even though the kit my end still has power – that’s not acceptable and wasn’t the case in ADSL days as the exchanges have generators.
Having failed to get through to 999 on my mobile, I asked my ISP to follow the Ofcom Guidelines in General Condition A 3.2 (b) and provide a solution that would ensure that I could reach 999 if I lost domestic power due to a fire or flood that tripped my power, or a widespread power cut. They gave me a month to move my VOIP and Broadband to new suppliers.
Ofcom had no interest in this, referring me to the relevant dispute resolution service (DRS), who eventually decided that providing Battery Backup is entirely optional. Unless the DRS have erred, (no appeals) then Ofcom have written documents that sound tough but are completely irrelevant.
The ISP is unable to provide you with a service that meets your requirements and so they have ceased it. Presumably they didn’t hold you to contract term?
I would also add – what do you mean by the term “VOIP”. Do you mean an ISP supplied and managed landline replacement service such as BT/EE Digital Voice or the Sky/TalkTalk/Vodafone/Virgin equivalents, or do you mean an ITSP provided service?
If the latter, I wouldn’t be surprised by their refusal to act.
Your mobile would have used any available network to connect to 999.
Which is why if you can’t use any network we are even having this debate?!
Didn’t the older Openreach ONTs have a battery backup attached to do this very same thing but was then removed with the newer ONT with just one smaller unit?
Yes but that only supported the ONT. Of course, you also need one to support your router and, in some cases, a cordless base station.
8 hours is a bit fanciful anyway. Even one of the bigger domestic UPS units will only give 2 -3 hours and that’s if the battery is brand new and fully charged. UPS batteries do deteriorate fairly quickly.