back to article BT argues Ofcom is 'mistaken' on Ethernet price capping plan

BT has hit out at Ofcom over its plans to tighten control of pricing of the national telco's wholesale Ethernet services outside London and Hull by describing the decision to regulate high speed data links as a "mistake". The move came as Britain's communications watchdog notified the European Commission of its proposals to …

COMMENTS

This topic is closed for new posts.
  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Makes me wonder....

    If this is just an eyewash.

  2. HollyHopDrive

    they always moan...

    ....its just the way BT is. To be honest BT are the problem with the market imho. They drag their feet. ADSL took agrees because they thought ISDN was the future. Then speeds were slow for much longer than they needed to be. Fibre is taking too long to get to market across the *majority* country.I'm one of the lucky ones but work with people who are still stuck on 5mb ADSL services.

    BT need a kick in the arse. They fail to realise if they behaved better they wouldnt get so regulated. It's a bit like my bloody kids fighting over the TV. If my son shared a bit better my daughter would make a lot less fuss and I wouldnt need to get involved and lay the law down to my son. He doesn't get it either ;)

    1. cynic56

      Re: they always moan...

      I dream of being "stuck on 5mb ADSL services". I once got 1.7 but it was just a brief highlight before reverting to 1.4 again.

      I blame BT too - it makes me feel better when it's someone else's fault.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    If the telecom market is "highly competitive", why am I and my employer's IT guys stuck constantly dealing with BT's constant incompetence while dearly wishing we could switch our service to someone, ANYONE else?

    1. Chloe Cresswell Silver badge

      Even so..

      Even when you can get them from someone else, BTopenreach are still involved and inject a level of uselessness that you know the actual supplier isn't causing :(

      1. Alan Brown Silver badge

        Re: Even so..

        FWIW, Ofcom are more than happy to take specific complaints about openreach from endusers, but they do want to know which supplier is affected.

        The more openreach-specific complaints they get, they mroe likely they are to make at leats a token effort to do something.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Competitive?

    What they mean by 'highly competitive' is thet there's a lot of competition to buy the service from BT so they need to regulate this by increasing prices.

  5. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge
    WTF?

    How will this help?

    How is forcing BT to reduce prices by RPI-11 going to encourage other operators to enter the market? Wouldn't it be better to let BT charge what it likes, as a way of creating an opportunity for a lower-coast operator to step in? All OfCom is doing is to ensure that BT has a low-profit monopoly, that doesn't seem helpful.

    1. HMB

      Re: How will this help?

      Newcomers to hard-line telecoms? You're optimistic!

      With the government's tax system on optical fibre links the small guy gets the most squeezing. With no finalised system for sharing ducts and poles, how would a new operator even begin to invest in new Infrastructure?

      BT want more money than Dr Evil just to hook up people with fibre, so are we being realistic with this idea that we can have effective competition with telecoms in the UK? The best you'll get is Virgin Vs BT. Virgin are in monstrous debt from their existing deployment and leave a significant proportion of people unplugged.

      The UK is a hostile environment to telecom start-ups. One would almost think it had been engineered so too.

  6. Alan Brown Silver badge

    "highly competitive" means that we have to pay 35% more for our 1Gb fibre tail than we would if we were 7 miles down the road where there are competing suppliers.

    Why do you think BT moves so quickly to shut down any move by competitors to setup shop in areas where it's the only game in town? It's all about protecting the prices they're allowed to charge.

  7. Dennis Wilson
    Facepalm

    Shafted

    As normal for just about everything good old London gets left out. It's like we all have lurgy.

This topic is closed for new posts.

Other stories you might like