Contacting Sky about a UPS for vulnerable people in a rural area with no mobile signal

[oh+hell+no]

Hello.. I live in a very remote and rural community with a high % of elderly people. 

We quite often have power cuts in the winter and we rely on our analogue landlines, even though most of us have digital phones we have the old style phones to fallback on in the event of a powercut., which can last from several hours to several days.

The switching over to a digital line is concerning many of us, we don't have a mobile signal in many parts, and the signal we do have will only support voice and not data and is still quite sketchy. Therefore in the event of a power outage, we quite often have no way to understand what is happening and how long it will take (no Internet access) and no means to call the emergency services if they are required.

Therefore I and those who use Sky in our community need to know what resilience plans Sky have that can help us stay connected with the outside world in times of power outage?

I understand that some service providers I.E. BT will supply a UPS and digital phone to enable people to stay connected.

Thank You.

[Mark39]

So far as I'm aware, Sky haven't announced any resiliency measures for their digital phone service. We are, however, a customer Community so you might want to speak directly to Sky to see if they have anything in plan.

[oh+hell+no]

Hi.. 

Yup, tried that.. spoke to a Customer Services agent and they didn't know.. I get the feeling that you would need to speak to a more "specific" agent than the general Customer Service people. 

I'm just wondering if there is contact details for a department dealing with the switch from copper to digital, I cannot find one..

Kind regards

[Mark39]

There's no direct numbers, I'm afraid. All calls are routed, via the customer service advisers.

[oh+hell+no]

Thought that would be the case.. many thanks for your input.. Kind regards

[TimmyBGood]

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@oh+hell+no wrote:

Therefore I and those who use Sky in our community need to know what resilience plans Sky have that can help us stay connected with the outside world in times of power outage?

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I'd direct you to what Ofcom requires of ISPs:

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/news-centre/2023/protecting-customers-during-the-migration-to-digital-landl... 

• We published guidance on protecting customers’ access to emergency services during a power cut. This requires providers to provide a minimum of one hour’s power resilience to consumers in the event of a power cut. If consumers need to use their landline to call the emergency services, this must be provided free of charge.
• We’ve set out our expectations of communications providers in relation to PSTN switchover. This set out how they  should support and protect customers, particularly those who are vulnerable, and included specific provisions on customers who use services such as telecare devices.
• We published best practice principles for the upgrade process, which includes detailed requirements including support for vulnerable customers, and battery back-up.

[TimmyBGood]

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@oh+hell+no wrote:

I understand that some service providers I.E. BT will supply a UPS and digital phone to enable people to stay connected.

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BT offers its own-brand (and proprietary) 'Digital Voice' handsets to all its broadband users: those aren't specifically part of any resilience policy and require working broadband to make and receive voice calls.

All ISPs who bundle a voice call service should have some way of providing a UPS to 'vulnerable' customers, but as noted above, Ofcom specifies a whole one hour of run-time which is frankly pathetic.

It's worth noting that any UPS for this purpose has to support the ISP router, the ONT (for FTTP broadband), WiFi from the router and any cabled phone hardware.

[TimmyBGood]

@oh+hell+no 

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/consultations-and-statements/category-2/access-emergency-organisations-powe... 

[mormegil]

Sky's sales guidance for VoIP is if the customer does not have a mobile phone with a good signal in the property then they should not be selling the product to that customer

bt and I believe virgin offer battery back up but is only for the Ont so the router and telephone handset would still not work

[TimmyBGood]

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@mormegil wrote:

bt and I believe virgin offer battery back up but is only for the Ont so the router and telephone handset would still not work

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I wouldn't think that's correct, as it would leave the provider outside compliance with the Ofcom document above.

businessdirect.bt.com lists a UPS specifically designed to power ONT, Smart Hub 2 and an attached phone as an aftermarket accessory, and I'd imagine that's the hardware which BT uses for 'vulnerable' domestic customers too, particulary given the web blurb specifically mentions the 'one hour' runtime minimum target.

https://www.businessdirect.bt.com/products/cyberpower-back-up-for-bt-digital-voice-service--fttp 

There's a different model for FTTC, presumably without an ONT power outlet.

https://www.businessdirect.bt.com/products/cyberpower-back-up-for-bt-digital-voice-service--non-fttp 

I'd note there does appear to be some confusion in the .pdf product specification sheets though.  It's also interesting to me that these UPS units appear to be custom designs from Cyberpower for BT, and deliberately leave out any additional power output sockets, presumably to extent their run time.

[TimmyBGood]

@mormegil 

Previous posts in this forum suggest Virgin was at least trialing a different approach in their Emergency Backup Line (EBUL).  The v1 was a battery powered cellular router, while the v3 is a self-contained non-smart cellular handset.