Re: Of course Voda want direct dark fibre access
Here's a big argument in favour of dark fibre (and there are various flavours of that including multiplexed bandwidths)
The less "stuff" there is along the line, the more reliable it tends to be.
EVERY SINGLE FAILURE on our current circuits has been down to BT interface equipment, but thanks to the current multilayer supplier approach that's added _at least_ 6 hours to repair time, every time - BT monitor their circuits and have known full well they have a fault but won't lift a finger until the telco we contract with raises a fault with them and jumps through hoops to do so (BT won't tell them their kit is down, so a telco tech has to drive out to the site and verify the BT interface kit has died), with a minimum delay to get onsite and deal with it of 2 hours.
One particular BT optical interface in Reigate is repeatedly failing (wedges and needs power cycling) - but BT refuse to replace it "as it tests ok".
When BT were the end-to-end supplier they treated interface faults as an automatic callout and have been known to have people onsite in 20 mins. They replaced dead kit on the spot. Interestingly although they're the supplier of the tail circuit in any case, the figure they charged us for it was _lower_ than the what they charge the competing telco.
Anyone who actually believes there's a full separation of Openreach/BTwholesale/BTretail has forgotten that BT Head office can see over the walls and direct operations _and_ that there's clear customer experience that contradicts that assertion.
It was investigation into the BT/Openreach model which made New Zealand regulators realise that it's a sham and that the only way to achieve true separation and market fairness the divisions had to be completely separated into different companies with different financials, shareholding, CEO, Board and offices.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
