BT hit by £42m fine from Ofcom

[Topper]

BT has been hit with a £42m fine from telecoms regulator Ofcom and has set aside £300m to repay providers for delays in installing high-speed lines.

Ofcom said the fine was the largest it had ever handed down.

It found BT's Openreach division had cut compensation payments to telecoms providers for delays in installing the lines between early 2013 and late 2014.

Openreach chief executive Clive Selley said the firm "apologised wholeheartedly"for the mistakes.

The investigation found BT had broken rules put in place to counter its "significant market power" by cutting the payments.

Gaucho Rasmussen, Ofcom's investigations director, said: "These high-speed lines are a vital part of this country's digital backbone.

"We found BT broke our rules by failing to pay other telecoms companies proper compensation when these services were not provided on time.

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[Channel Hopper]

I wonder if this was the reason any time I had reason to complain to BT (both residential and business lines) for shoddy internet they were quick to infer that Openreach had nothing to do with them ?

 

[Captain Jack]

Technically BT's line and internet side of business is completely separate from Openreach. They have no more leverage over OR than any other BT based provider.

Allegedly.

 

[Channel Hopper]

Technically BT's line and internet side of business is completely separate from Openreach. They have no more leverage over OR than any other BT based provider.

Allegedly.

Ah, so the engineer was simply borrowing the Openreach van when BT bothered to acknowledge the faults existed.