New build telephone sockets

[JohnD76]

Hi,

I have just moved into a new build town house which has a telephone socket on every floor, 3 in total. BT have activated our line and only the downstairs socket is working.

There is a grey Telephone box by the front door that has a cable from BT, I presume, coming out of the ground which has a black shielding on the cable and numerous wires coming out of it. There is also a cable coming out of the house which also has numerous wires with some of the wires connected to the BT cable. I am presuming the wires that are connected are for the active socket in the house.....

I guess I need to connect up the other cables from the house to the same coloured cables from the BT line, does anyone know if this is correct? Or can anyone point me in the right direction since I need to get the other points active for the Sky+ box we have and for ADSL.

If I do this will these simply be an extension, or are these cables provided to give us another phone line in the house? What I am after is, ideally, all three sockets to be active on the same number since I do not want to pay BT any more money for additional line rental etc.

I am a bit confused but need to get the other sockets up and running since I would like to activate my SKY+ box in time for the easter weekend.

BT have told me they will charge either a £65 call out fee or £110 per extension, depending on who I talk to. They have also told me that an electrician could do it or I could do it myself.

Any helps is greatly appreciated.

Many thanks,

John.

 

[Static]

New build? get the building contractor to sort it at his cost.

 

[JohnD]

OOI, in my areas, the grey plastic box by the front door is the way the Cable TV & Telecomms companies do it - does BT also do it that way now?

 

[JohnD76]

I have spoken with the developers and they will only wire up the main point in the house and it is apparently my responsibility to get the other points wired up

Has anyone got any experience with this?

John, I am guessing that all Telco's use the same cabling to the house. In our case, BT are using this box.

Cheers,

John.

 

[JohnD]

I think your housebuilder is trying to fob you off with an unconvincing excuse. If he gets away with it he will save himself trouble and expense. Add it to your written list of faults you have found in the house that you will be using in your later complaint and clim for rectification.

But you might find it a few minutes work to do it yourself, can you lay your hands on a digital camera and post pics of the insides of your main and secondary sockets, showing the wires and connections?

 

[Static]

Is the house builder a big name ? You could always try complaining to their head office etc,. If they are supplying items in the house to the Architect/Clients requirements and not connecting them up correctly they arent connecting them together then they arent doing their job.
You wouldnt expect to find things like light switches for instance that arent connected to the mains circuit in a new build and then get told you have to do it yourself.

 

[LeeJC]

In answer to your questions BT use mutlicore cable for all installs, generally 4 pair, because it offers better reliabililty and some redundancy should you report faults, just because these lines enter your box they will not be live until connected into the distribution nodes (Big Green boxes you see them rooting about in)

**** If you call out BT to repair a fault, all the following work must be undone before they will even start checking your line****

The phone socket you have on the wall, pull it and on the back you will see a 6 position krone block (it may be screw terminals, but bt equipment is generally always krone), connections 2 and 5 will be connected to the cable entering your house.

All you need to do is punch your extensions onto this block at 2 and 5 and ensure the corresponding colour coded cable is punched into 2 and 5 at the other extensions. Allowing you to run 3 connection points off a single line.

The only time BT will complain is if your REN (ringer equivalence number) exceeds 4.

All communications devices connected to lines should have somewhere on them a REN value, keep it below 4 and you are laughing.