BT’s wholesale high-speed broadband connection tariff is to be substantially reduced from summer next year, the company has announced.
The monthly tariff – which is based on allowing third parties to connect homes and businesses using fibre optic technology to provide internet speeds of up to 300Mbps – is to be reduced from £60 to £38 per connection.
BT, however, will be charging wholesalers an additional one-off premium of £1,000 per connection for extending the fibre optic wire direct to the address of each customer concerned (fibre-to-the-premises, or FTTP) in order for the customer to be able to secure the maximum 300Mbps speed.
The wholesale provider will then be free to decide on whether to pass this cost – which is levied over and above a standard installation charge of £500 – on to customers.
Standard high-speed connections are not as powerful since they are based on the fibre optic cable reaching only as far as a street cabinet (fibre-to-the cabinet, or FTTC), with the remaining connection to the premises being made using a copper cable.
BT says it expects wholesalers will find that the premium high-speed FTTP service will be mainly taken up by small to medium sized enterprises (SMEs), keen to utilise the benefits of access to higher broadband speeds.
Commenting on the move, BT Openreach’s managing director for next generation access, Mike Galvin, said:
“Our deployment is one of the fastest in the world and our services are proving very popular with the public. It is now time for us to focus further on FTTP. I am sure that small businesses will welcome this major price cut.”
Among the benefits for businesses of high-speed broadband are maximising the volume and quality of data communications, and taking advantage of added value services such as internet protocol (IP) telephony and business VoIP (voice over internet protocol).
