The End of Analogue Phone Lines
Comments
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Don't think it's anything to do with that ET. The current BB at about 20 Mbs is fine - so that begs the question of why do I actually need superfast which is advertised at anything up to 100Mbs and beyond. We occasionally get slight buffering when streaming on the TV but that's the only indication that faster might be better because of the greater bandwidth.
It's more to do with the psychological thing of not having a landline. It used to be said that it was important for credit referencing purposes etc - but that's not an issue for us anymore. I suppose once the landline facility has gone, the decision will be made for me - but I just feel I'm moving out of my comfort zone a bit - which is a bit strange because I'm usually the one to embrace new technology.
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I thought BT used to have in place a monitoring system at exchange level so if you switch of your router an alarm was triggered at the exchange, if the router was switched off for an extended period, i thought they used to drop the line so the alarm did not continue, and then you had to contact BT to get the line restored
our system is fibre to the cabinet at entrance to close and then copper on poles to the bungalow, worked at home for 4 years using this system, could be slow sometimes but mostly it was ok, with BT and a bit reluctant to move although expensive as, touch wood, their track record for system up time is excellent in our area. Use the land line a lot as we have unlimited calls 24x7x365, and whereas you were charged for anything longer than 1 hour, now it is unlimited, OH can run down a mobile phone battery on just 1 call
,mailbox and 1471 which is last number that called you, which can be handy. 0 -
We still have the landline as it comes with the BB, £21 per month, but an unlimited calls package was another £10 per month. Calls otherwise were very expensive. It seems all the "wired" BB deals include the possibility to have a phone connected too, fine for receiving calls. We have had our landline number for 33 years, so a lot of people have it.
Calls on our PAYG are 3p per minute, so if you get put on hold for ages, especially prevalent with banks etc at the moment, it soon mounts up.
So we are now paying a total of £26 per month for everything, and can annoy the kids by calling them as often as we like!
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Over here in the rural wilds of France, we have 2 types of connection. There is fixed line or mobile. Fixed line can be anything that connects to the exchange, copper wire, fibre, (or string as long as it is kept tight). Mobile connects via magic to some tower somewhere without a physical connection. Simple distinction. (Although there is mobile calling over WiFi which muddies the distinction a little bit).
At home, we started off with a copper wire connection, which powered the phone, and was therefore usable in a power cut. The exchange had battery backup in case they were also affected by a power cut. When we went for the internet, the modem was connected to the same wires using a ‘splitter’ which kept the phone power out of the modem, and the modem whistles out of the phone. Much like the UK.
We then went to a VOIP connection, which used the same copper line, but the phone moved to a socket on the back of the modem. We lost the power backup but gained internet speed. An incentive was the removal of the ‘phone line’ rental charge. The modem changed here at home, but the bigger change was in the exchange and didn’t directly affect us. We could plug in any modern phone of our choice, the connection is standardised and the modem takes care of putting the phone signal onto the internet line. Old phones that used the exchange power to ring the bell won’t work, so in that case there is a replacement cost to the subscriber. We also gained unlimited calling throughout France to fixed lines and also to lots of other countries. For a small increment, we can also call unlimited French mobiles. Our internet speed varied in this configuration between 5 and 8 Mbits/s, (depending on who knows what).
The next change came when fibre was installed in the village. The fibre was put in alongside the copper cables, which are on poles in this village. Changing was optional, and we did so. This involved a new modem, and a man came and installed fibre from our nearest pole, through the house, into the back of the modem. This done, our internet speed went up to a quite reliable 900 Mbits/s. From the phone point of view, nothing changed, we still have a fixed line, with the same phone.
To provide emergency backup, we use a couple of mobile phones, and they are on a plan with the fixed line supplier, so we have one monthly fee for the lot. There is no fixed line internet data limit, and I have 80 Gb per month on the phone, at 4G speeds. A few months ago, there was a major outage for a lot of the internet over here, and I was immediately given an extra 200 Gb per month on the mobile to cover my needs, which lasted until the end of the month after the internet was restored and the modem woke up.
The push to fibre, coupled with mobile coverage to everywhere is being driven by the government. No new ‘only phone line’ connections are being made. The bottom line is that if you have a fixed line using VOIP, then backup communications will be down to you. To help this, there are low price internet/mobile packages available, and basic phones are very cheap in the supermarkets. If you don’t want the internet, then the modem will just sit there as a place to connect the phone. The modem is designed to be powered continuously, and is expected to be left like that, so the phone will be available 24/7.
Pretty similar to the UK I guess.1
