Australia's Telstra Requires Fibre Customers To Use Copper Telephone

daria42 writes "Progress is happening rapidly in Australia, with the country's government continuing to roll out a nation-wide fibre network. However, the country's major telco Telstra doesn't appear to have quite gotten the message. Releasing its first National Broadband Network fibre broadband plans today, the telco stipulated that fibre customers will still be forced to make phone calls over the telco's existing copper network. Yup, that's right — fibre to people's houses, but phone calls over the copper network. Progress."

Comments

Typical

[SultanCemil]

Some cynical people might even suspect a plot here - our right wing party would love to bury the NBN and have been claiming that it'll be more expensive than ADSL services - perhaps Telstra wants to give them more ammunition, and muddy the waters at the same time?

Re:Typical

[Andy Dodd]

So what? It's not like copper for phone calls has any disadvantages. Quality will be about the same unless wideband VoIP is deployed (almost no one has done that), and it's better for safety since the copper phone lines are powered by the CO, which usually has multiple redundant backup power supplies. If your home's power goes out - you can call 911 with copper but not with VoIP.

Could make sense

[NFN_NLN]

Fiber requires external power for the lasers.
Traditional phones lines are powered by the telco so they'll work during a standard blackout.

Re:Could make sense

[miaDWZ]

Traditional phones lines are powered by the telco so they'll work during a standard blackout.

All NBN endpoints have a backup battery to allow phones to continue to work for a good few hours even in a power outage.

Re:Could make sense

[miaDWZ]

The telco (unless it is third world) will have massive diesel generators (and a stock pile of diesel) to keep things operational in an emergency. As long as there is electricity or diesel the phones should continue to work.

That's true. Although, in reality I think 9/10 households will be using a cordless phone which will be useless in a power outage, regardless to how you're hooked into the phone network. Speaking of which, can you even buy non-cordless phones these days?

Re:Could make sense

[psergiu]

Mod Gradparent Up !

In some magical land, all endpoints have battery backup. In Romania, for example, they don't - a backup battery must be replaced every 3 years or so - which can become expensive. I refused to allow the local telco to install FTTH in my apartment building as all the cooper landlines (powered by the large battery pack + diesel generator at the CO) would have been replaced by VoIP over that fibre. Lousy audio quality, no battery backup, end-point equipment usually locks up during brown-outs. I'm ok with slower ADSL that works 24/7.

Way to go, Telestra ! They still have some smart people in charge.

Re:Could make sense

[Capsaicin]

If ice storm knock down the power line, it will knock down the phone line too.

It just goes to show the cavalier attitude of the Labor government that they haven't adequately planned for vast tracts of Australia being taken out by ice storms.

Re:Could make sense

[viperidaenz]

Don't kid yourself. Telstra are doing it for one reason: Money. They have an existing copper network, if it fails to generate revenue it turns into a worthless multi-billion dollar liability that they will still have to maintain year after year.
Their New Zealand subsidiary, TelstraClear, kicked up a huge fuss about over-building their docsis cable network with a government subsidised national fibre network build. They threw their toys out their cot and threatened to shut up shop and leave the country.
Last time I was on their cable network you couldn't buy internet services without a $50/month phone line.

Re:Could make sense

[atomicthumbs]

Should someone really have to buy a very expensive satellite phone + plan, or move somewhere else, because their telephone company wants to replace their (perfectly fine) POTS connection with something that stops working a little while after the power goes out?

Re:Could make sense

[EdIII]

They won't operate the same at all.

If "copper telephones" are anything like what we have in the US, a corded telephone connected to the wall receives all the power it needs to operate from the CO (central office) in the street. In this situation the telco does not need to concern itself about any equipment on-premises. As long as the customer has a standard cordless telephone that is enough to place a call.

This is the primary reason why people claim that corded telephones and copper service is the most reliable method of communication in an emergency. Which is true as long as you place zero responsibility on the consumer beyond the possession of a standard telephone required for service.

The alternative is still fairly cheap, but it requires telcos to actually upgrade. There is no reason that the same battery/diesel backups in the CO's can't be used as a backup for fiber.

What is not solved is that you now need battery backup on-premises. That is not an insurmountable problem. Most cable companies in the US have been offering VOIP service for years with equipment that has built-in battery backups. It varies, but I have seen VOIP only equipment that allows a standard phone connection, and cablemodem/VOIP combos that do both. In any case, $50 at any electronics store will get you a battery backup capable of a few hours with the load from a base station for a cordless telephone.

The biggest challenge in the US has been providing emergency phone call support. For quite some time VOIP services offered by the cable companies did not have the capability of connecting you to the correct PSAP and transmitting the correct information. To my knowledge that has been largely solved. The major VOIP providers I deal with have been offering e911 services for almost two years and I have been able to offer 911 on any VOIP desk phone in any branch office with only minor coding efforts.

I don't know how much money the telcos would gain by getting rid the COs entirely. I am betting that they are staying on copper for telephone because it is cheaper than upgrading all the COs to fiber and providing customers on-premises equipment that they have never had to provide before.

Also remember, that battery/diesel backups don't last forever anyways. That goes for cell phone towers too. Any major disaster with sustained power outages for more than a day or two is going to see severe impact in service for all communications.

Re:Could make sense

[Mr0bvious]

Indeed - sorry I must have been half asleep (perhaps fully asleep) when I made that post - for some reason I thought the OP I replied too was claiming that the cordless phones will be useless in a power outage when the fibre replaces the copper - obviously upon rereading that post I was actually in fierce agreement with the OP..

I'll get back in my box now..

ps, I'm an Australian and pretty much everyone I know uses their mobile (cell) phone as their primary voice contact device - we use our copper lines for our ADSL connections... I don't even have a handset plugged into my copper outlet.

The rental on a copper line from Telstra is over $30 a month - all we get for that is the ability to make charged phone calls - I make none, so I pay $30 a month to Telstra for my phone line just to get ADSL from my ISP over. My ISP charges me $50 a month for a 100GB of data over a ADSL 2 connection over that Telstra copper - I can only acheive a very poor 1 - 2Mb over that very poor and under maintained expensive Telstra copper and I'm in a nice dense suburban area. So I end up paying over $80 a month for a poor 1 - 2Mb connection.

I can go 'naked' - that's the term for having a internet connection without paying Telstra for the copper - you pay the ISP instead, and the ISP install hardware in the Telstra exchange to handle their own back haul. But this saves only $60 a year as the ISP need to pay telstra a portion still, hardly worth it for the down side... Basically Telstra applies a tax on the entire copper system, that I'm sure I've paid for now at least 10 times over.. Its a hideous monopoly that I can't wait to see the back of.

Re:Really a big deal?

[mcbridematt]

All copper lines in the fibre footprint under the Australian NBN rollout are being decommissioned, the only people who will remain are those getting wireless or satellite broadband services, for POTS usage.

Some would argue that Telstra, by keeping the copper lines active until forced to decommission them (as is the deal), makes it easier for a future opposition government to scuttle the fibre rollout.

Re:progress

[Ghaoth]

I suggest you don't live here. There are many parts of Australia where Telstra is the only supplier. their mandate, aparrt from making money, is to provide communications to all of Austrlaia. Most of the other companies suck in rural and outback areas. It there was an alternative, that would be called competition.

This is Australia calling.

[mjwx]

It's Telstra, what do you expect. This is the company that has kept regional centres on dialup and whilst giving a RIM-job to major urban centres.

They have repeatedly been busted for telling other telco's "there are no ports available at X exchange" but then selling Telstra ADSL services from the same supposedly full exchange.

Do you honestly expect Telstra not to try and screw up the NBN.