Will plusnet provide a voip landline service?

[#1]

The USO only applies to BT (retail) and KCOM

[#2]

@MisterW
Thanks for clarifying the USO situation.
It seems that Plusnet is still the only "large" ISP that does not plan to provide any voice services going forward.
For those Plusnet customers who will require voice services then there seem to be only two options, roll your own or move ISP.

[#3]

Just posted my comment on this in another thread, but thought I'd put it here as well.

I've heard a slightly different story from the support team, who advised me on an inbound call last week that the infrastructure is there, and there are talks within the team leader meetings about rolling it out, and there is a chance we plusnet customers MAY be getting it in the near future. So all hope is not lost yet.

If BT choose not to roll it out before December 2025, then they are putting Plusnet on a suicide mission, as all those who need their landline will invariably go somewhere else. Many Plusnet Customers won't pay through the nose for EE Prices.

[#4]

@hpjohnson See my reply over there.

[#5]

Just a bit more to add to my comment above, again I posted this in the analogue thread as well.

The Plusnet Hub 2 is a clone of the BT Smart Hub 2, painted white with a different badge on the front. Having moved between them back in November, the functionality and performance of the broadband is identical. There is definitely a Digital voice socket on the back of them.

But, Plusnet appears to have disabled the Digital VOICE Functionality through a customisation of the firmware, to tailor it for Plusnet as opposed to BT, hence why you can't see Digital VOICE options at all. 

But, Plusnet and BT share the same platform for service provision, I.e they both use BT's Infrastructure.

As such, it would presumably be a matter of issuing a firmware update for the Plusnet Hub 2 to enable the functionality for Digital VOICE, this means it is simply a waiting game for the man in the back office to flip the switch and bring Digital VOICE to Plusnet Customers.

The man I spoke to sounded pretty confident that they will be doing something.

[#6]

This is far from being just a technology consideration.  There is billing, service and support to consider.  Those are far more of a consideration than tweaking the firmware.  IIRC, the internals of the Plusnet Hub Two are different to the similarly packaged BT Smart Hub 2.

[#7]

@Townman @jab1 

In terms of sale and service, presumably customers would simply plug their home phone into the port on the router, there would be no need for special plusnet specific digital home phones, like BT have done as this would incur a business expense.

Also it would encourage recycling of analogue home phones which can continue to function using the Hub Twos ATA functionality. 

For pricing, customers would have to pay a fair contribution, I think BT Charges £16 for theirs. And yes, it may put some people off taking it immediately, but the fact that the option would be there would still ensure that those who need to keep their landline, like the elderly, the vulnerable and those who don't use mobiles, can do so, without having to switch provider unnecessarily.

Also, in terms of selling digital voice, this could mirror BT, where the initial sale is for the broadband only, and customers can choose to opt in to digital voice if they require it. This would reduce the load on the support staff.

Just imagine the prospect of ordering Plusnet Broadband at say £24.99 for the cheap option, and having the ability to opt into "PlusTalk" as a voice add on to broadband.

There are ways and means of making this work. I would be interested to hear what the staff have to say to this proposition.

[#8]

@hpjohnson As I am no longer a PN customer, I will leave the finer details to such as @Townman  and @MisterW who have more knowledge and greater insight into PN than myself, but BT Digital Voice - which is what you are referring to, is a proprietary BT service, requiring specific hardware, AIUI.

[#9]

The reason I left plusnet (after over 20 years) us because of the direction BT group is steering it.

They don't appear to give a sh about the customers ...  i guess easy come, easy go.

They forget the garden customer to sell to is an ex-customer.

As for special equipment for bt voice, it us just a sip service.  Special equipment is an analog telephone adaptor built into the router with a bt specific configuration of servers to work with.  Others provide 'digital voice' services' too.

[#10]

It’s been a while since I last posted on this thread. At the time I had just bought a cheap ATA form eBay and opened an account with a VOIP provider in order to learn more about VOIP.

Obviously I can’t compare “Plusnet Voice” with VOIP as it doesn’t currently exist but I would surmise if and when it does it will be a clonish copy of BT Voice?

I don’t personally have any experience of either BT Voice or the Sky equivalent but I do have friends who do. In both cases they tell me there’s no difference with the old landline. The exception being the BT customer who has two handsets which appear to ‘Bluetooth’ to the router, or is it WiFi, otherwise their old analogue phones work OK.

My [limited] experience of VOIP is that it is much more flexible than a conventional landline. The one downside I’ve so far encountered is that if my ATA is powered off for some reason and therefore not currently registered in my VOIP account anyone dialling  my number gets the ‘number not been recognised’ of ‘invalid number’ message which could potentially lead to some confusion. Of course this doesn’t happen if you unplug a phone from PSTN!

I just wonder how robust independent VOIP is compared to the old POTS (PSTN)?

All rather sad really because I too have been with Plusnet for over 20 years without complaint, apart from which they have been [up to now] very amenable at negotiating when my contract is ending and in one case when moving house. There again my current Plusnet contract has a year to run so no desperate rush to do anything. Maybe things will change after September when copper based lines will stop being sold altogether?

[#11]

@Batfrog 

"two handsets which appear to ‘Bluetooth’ to the router, or is it WiFi,"

I think that it's DECT - the standard for cordless phones:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_enhanced_cordless_telecommunications

[#12]

I doubt it . Plusnet have lost Mobile to EE but I have been very pleased with the changeover with the superb customer service provided by Plusnet.EE's customer service has been non existent and without human voice contact ,except through Plusnet..

I would think Plusnet will dissappear when the landline gets cut off in December 2025.

My next door neighbours landline phone stopped working two weeks ago but the BT broadband was fine.When they came to fix the fault the BT engineer said she would have to have an adaptor plugged into her Router/modem for her analogue phone to function .This fixed one phone but the Burgler Alarm now shows a faulty phone line .I installed the Alarm System and it requires a WIFI adaptor but the BT engineer would not fix the problem.

Also my neighbour has TWO other wired phone extensions which are now non functional..She is 89 years old ,I thoughi BT were not changing vunerable groups of people (over 70's etc)  over to digital until later.  

[#13]

The one downside I’ve so far encountered is that if my ATA is powered off for some reason and therefore not currently registered in my VOIP account anyone dialling  my number gets the ‘number not been recognised’ of ‘invalid number’ message which could potentially lead to some confusion. Of course this doesn’t happen if you unplug a phone from PSTN!

@Batfrog Im possibly a bit late with a reply, but that shouldnt be the case? On both of my voip accounts, if the connection isnt registered, then the call goes straight to voicemail. I then get an email notifying me.

[#14]

@MisterW Im possibly a bit late with a reply, but that shouldn’t be the case? On both of my voip accounts, if the connection isn’t registered, then the call goes straight to voicemail. I then get an email notifying me.

Thanks for that MisterW. Funnily enough I had resolved this issue only a week or so ago. I’m not a big answerphones fan and hadn’t bothered to set it up. When I came to look at the VOIP incoming calls detail the answerphone section has a ‘Busy/Fail’ setting, with that set the problem has gone away.

At the moment VOIP is a bit experimental for me, to gain some knowledge/experience of the system as I too think Plusnet could well eventually disappear in the jaws of BT!

The idea (by no means original) is to separate telephone voice from broadband which gives much more flexibility than say the BT or SKY option. I’m a bit old school and want a phone at home rather than using just a mobile as an increasing number of people do.  I’ve said earlier, I don’t want incoming personal and private conversations in the supermarket, on the train, whilst driving or any other inconvenient place

[#15]

The idea (by no means original) is to separate telephone voice from broadband which gives much more flexibility than say the BT or SKY option.

A good plan!. I started with voip about 5 years ago, initially with the landline still used for incoming calls but voip (presenting the landline CLI) for outgoing, mainly to reduce call costs. Since moving to FTTP a couple of years ago, I'm now voip only.

I also converted the office from multiple ISDN lines to a voip PBX, saved a fortune!!