Member Info for NDNIC00

Correct. Did not put that across well should have said last report not review...

Nige. Would think nothing will be known until the review is completed as it will be a confidential contract between BT and BTPS for whatever funding is required going forward. With the shortfall in the results was talking about £1b and a payment made in June, think 400m, hopefully it will be much less than the £7b at the last review. GLA

From BTs.com/halo

Important information

The legal stuff

? From 1 September 2020, if you sign up to a new contract or renew your contract for a Landline (including call charges, features, add-ons and plans), BT Mobile (including plans, monthly add-ons, call, text and data charges), BT Broadband, BT TV or BT Sport (including TV and Sport add-ons) the monthly price will increase each year from March 2021. That increase is based on the Consumer Price Index rate of inflation which is published in January each year plus 3.9%. Other terms, prices and products might also change during your contract.

Think that’s clear enough. Always check the small print, that’s why it’s there...

Don’t know about the rest of you, but after a few years I started to get a sixth sense for when the phone would ring. Perhaps you become accustomed to when it tended to happen, always seemed to be around 10pm in the weekday evenings. I still find that at night the slightest noise appears to rouse me, remember that when the phone rang at night there was a slight sort of part ring before it actually rang, like a rise in line voltage for ringing caused a blip. Strange how it still affects the body after leaving.

Just over 5 years was the accumulation of time. 27 years paid retainer on a one in 4 weeks, 24 hrs a day 7 day week and around 3 years voluntary on call on the same basis but did not have to attend if called just acting as a backup to the people on paid retainer. Yup been out on Christmas Day, snow rain wind but sometimes lovely sunshine, but not much of that at 2am...

Agree. Been there got the T-shirt spent the equivalent of over 5 years of my life on call 24/7/365. Thinking about it I didn’t even get the T-shirt...

Let’s get this sorted Aus.
“ PS. I am still of the opinion SKY (Comcast) will throw their Lott into this new business rather than carrying on relying on BT wholesale”
Your statement correct.
So to move away from BT completely Sky would need a full UK network, yes ?
There is at present no other full UK network be that fibre or copper, so Sky would have to have access to BT as well as VM. Yes ?
So are you saying people who want Sky BB will only be able to get it in VM locations, off course not, they will need BT as well won’t they ?
“ . I don’t think I’ve ever come across such uninformed arrogance. Well done for be world beating”
Thank you for that. There was a guy we worked with who’s nickname was “Dangerous “. The reason being he would, despite constantly being asked / told, get involved in things he had no training in or proper knowledge of, constantly causing issues due to his lack of real knowledge even though he thought he knew enough to get involved. I am beginning to think you may fall into that bracket, surfing the net for bits of information then cobbling it to gather to the point you know about the subject. A LITTLE BIT OF KNOWLEDGE IS A DANGEROUS THING.

“ PS. I am still of the opinion SKY (Comcast) will throw their Lott into this new business rather than carrying on relying on BT wholesale....... bearing in mind Comcast are a cable company”

So let’s just look at this in the real world rather than snippets from the internet cobbled together.
Building a full UK network, which is what you imply in your statement rather than picking the bits they want, will take around 10 years. The practical issues will possibly mean it could take longer, installing ductwork, manholes, street furniture, buildings to house node ends, all takes time. You can’t just start digging up a road or footpath, you need the relevant permissions from local authorities, highways agency and private land owners including wayleaves. Installing infrastructure on private property may also need to make rental payments each year, that can impact on there bottom line each year.
Then IF they were to get all that done there is no grantee that as they expand people will sign up, with a full UK network they would also face direct price competition with BT . So they spend all that time and money with no grantee of getting a return to cover there expenditure and be 5-10 years behind BT...
Get real, it now appears that the parent companies want rid of there siblings, if they were performing well and had a future of there own the parents would keep them.
Snippets from the net can paint a wonderful landscape, without a touch of the real world...

Nige. From your link.
However, both Telefonica and Liberty had been exploring exit options for their respective subsidiaries for some time.
So is this the deal both parties really want, or the best they can each find to offload parts of there business . Makes you wonder if it were to go ahead, as neither parents really want there offspring, would it actually have an impact on UK telecoms networks and services. Would appear this may not be the marriage made in heaven it has been presented as.

Oh. OK Mrs Brown....

Klingon ?

From BBC
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-54461226

The bid comes amid continued dissatisfaction among customers with the level of service they receive from TalkTalk.
In recent years, the firm has frequently been assigned low rankings in surveys by regulator Ofcom.
A shop, must be Poundland.
Not looking that good for VM/O2 either,

In the latest such example, the UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) signalled on Thursday that it wanted to investigate the proposed merger of Virgin Media and Virgin Mobile with O2.
Ummmm

Think history tells all you need to know. Dido, now running test and trace, so no change in ability there then, massive data breach a while ago, says a lot about there ability to protect data.

Aus. I have contacted Mr Jansen on your behalf, he says he is impressed with your insight and hopes to see you in his spare bedroom at 9am tomorrow to offer you a job. It’s the spare bedroom as he is working from home as his multi million pound new office is not quite ready yet.

Aus. So a new HQ to show the world that BT is a world class organisation that’s somewhere to meet and entertain corporate clients. Same as the use of the old location and cheaper in the long run to use and a better carbon footprint. Nothing wrong with impressing your clients and competitors.
Snow hill it mentions that BT will use most of the building but not all. No doubt Birmingham has many small offices not to mention the surrounding area, Coventry, Northampton, Rugby wich may well see staff moving freeing up more buildings.
Bristol, well that was mentioned in the original link as one of the early locations. Again Bristol and the surrounding area will current have many buildings that can be removed from the estate, there even used to be a training centre in Bristol, if that still exists it may also move in.
You seem to be trying to paint a picture of BT spendIng vast amounts of money on flash new buildings, they are not, just rationalising the estate over the next 3 years to reduce costs going forward. Staff who for whatever reason need office space and in the main it’s better to have them in around 30 locations than 300, or am I missing something there...

Fleccy. Much of what you say is true with regard to FTTP services, but other products such as Ethernet are not quite as simple to re locate to a more central location in a given area, especially somewhere like London. Ethernet at the exchange end integrates via patch’s to the core switch/router, each circuit will have an SFP that launches and receives light within a given range and may also have optical attention as well dependent upon the length/distance of the two ends. Therefor to move these services to another main end location will probably require a part or full new route it will require agreed down time, possibly several engineers and at least new SFPs. This may not be the most economic way to deal with such products in locations such as London so many exchange type buildings may well remain in use for some time to come. But the non operational parts of such locations can be used for anything, I know of one large exchange that when extended around 20 years ago now has shops in what was most of the ground floor space. Outside the large urban areas it will be easer to re locate such products as smaller exchanges may only carry a few tens of products compared to several hundred in compact urban areas...

Also where did, “ corporate sized ” come from and what exactly dose that mean, houses 100 people or 1000000 people ???

Aus. Firstly that information is from June 2019 so probably not to be considered the most recent update. Extracts from that document below.

We have dedicated teams working on identifying the best buildings to move into and which ones to redesign for the future. So as I suggested some may be new accommodation others existing locations to be adapted for there new roll.

As a result of this programme, BT people will be housed in inspiring offices that are better for our business and better for our customers.” I see no mention of, state of the art offices, can I ask where that came from.

BT announced that its key locations in the future will be in Belfast, Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Ipswich, London and Manchester. Where dose it mention, City centre locations, just the city’s and some may well be existing locations away from the centre...

“ Fleccy - the point is they are investing in 30 huge state of the art, city centre office centres.”
Aus, is huge state or the art, from an article or your considered opinion. Of the 30 I much doubt more than 2-3 will be new sites from BTs point of view, the rest will be existing locations. Having visited some of the larger sites in the past many are not a whole building but a few floors, some of which have effectively had vacant space for some time due to staff reductions or past consolidation of locations in some job functions. They will still be paying rent for that unused space, say a floor hear part of a floor there due to there lease contract. Those spaces will be filled as other locations close reducing costs.
“ Other companies manage their training etc without needing to have training centres, which I think are not subject to closure.”
How many companies have a Mobil field of telegraph poles, a street of ducts and manholes that they can transport around, a room full of transmission equipment that fits into a trailer, get real you need fixed locations for practical hands on training, not a laptop and a PDF package. I would expect the main technical training centre at Stone to remain as well as regional locations for the above.
And you know what, people perform better when they can interact with others in person, that little chat over a cup of tea, the bit of banter across the desk, the latest gossip, much better in the long run for many and the company. Those who choose to will probably still be able to work from home, others will need to have an office location to be at there best or due to the needs of there roll.

Aus. As mentioned by Fleccy a business as big and complex as the likes of BT will still need office space and some roles or personal situations will need an office location to perform there job.
Sales, project management, new build planning , and other back office functions will need places for meetings ( once Covid situation eases ) managers will need locations to store paper records and equipment, many other uses as well. I would estimate that around 80% of Mobil staff already work effectively from home with home parking and have done for many years. My understand is that they hope to have 30 buildings National for office space for the rolls that have that need, around 30% of exchange locations will close once the PSTN is switched off. The remaining exchanges will double up as stores locations, vehicle parking for larger vehicles, meeting centres for local teams to have briefings. Some locations will be needed for training, you can’t learn how to climb a pole from your spare room.
Your view that it has impacted on cutting jobs is irrelevant, they have been cutting stall for many years, the only change would appear to be moving away from voluntary losses to compulsory ones.