The End of POTs

Slide 1

What is a POT?

It just means a plain old telephone and was originally meant to mean 

Slide 2 

These type of phones use analogue technology. 

They use the electronic switching at the telephone exchange that has been around since the 1930’s when it first became possible to dial local calls directly and by 1970 direct dialling was being used on all international calls.

But even this type of phone still uses the old analogue system.

Slide 3 

It’s been decided to phase out all analogue telephone systems in favour of new digital connections which will rely on a broadband service to make the call.

What’s happening – they’re shutting down all the copper cable network and moving over to fibre for broadband.

Originally this was supposed to be by the end of next year but typical of BT they’re behind the curve. I checked all the addresses of members and only 6 are currently able to get full fibre. Which means that they’ve now extended the shutdown until January 2027. Although you might not be with BT directly all the other providers in this area use BT’s Openreach except for Virgin Media.

However Virgin Media are up to full steam, and they are saying that they will switch off at the end of 2025. I have checked all addresses again and only 4 can’t currently get full fibre connections with either Openreach or Virgin.

Slide 4

Even if you already use Virgin Media how do you know whether your analogue or digital. The end of the cable from the phone has a wide plug like this one.

Slide 5

And the socket on the wall which looks like this.

Slide 6

What this means is this phone will not work when the analogue system is switched off.

And neither will this.

Slide 7

The thing that a lot of people are doing is to just forget the landline and only use a mobile phone. My son has always done this for his domestic use. Originally my daughter and her husband had a landline but now they’ve given it up.

Your other option is to move your landline onto a VOIP system.

Slide 8

What is VOIP.

It just means Voice Over Internet Protocol – I told you they love their acronyms.

I think everybody here has used VOIP over several years without ever calling it that.

Slide 9

You connect a digital enabled phone to your broadband.

The good news is your monthly landline charge disappears although if you’re with BT they’ve put their prices up by a similar amount for broadband but not all providers have done this.

Your current provider probably does VOIP but not all do – I use Plusnet (a subsidiary of BT) and they don’t but at least broadband-only was £10 a month less than I was paying.

Even if your supplier does VOIP it might pay you to use a different supplier for that than your broadband supplier.

Here’s some examples. 

I think that shows just how much BT are taking the Micky when you compare 28.18p with 1.5p

Slide 10

The new system brings with it some problems: -

If you’ve got a burglar alarm connected to a central station it would originally have used an analogue phone line although providers are moving over to new systems. Geoff checked with his burglar alarm supplier, and they’ve already moved.

Care Systems used to be all on landlines. Bradford Council’s Safe and Sound system has moved across to using broadband, but they’ve now got such a backlog of old systems for InCommunities to convert that there’s now a 3 month wait to get one for a new user.

If there’s no power in your house the glib response is to use a mobile phone if you desperately need to contact somebody. But the mobile phone towers need power to operate so its quite likely your mobile phone will not be able to get a signal.

Slide 11

More acronyms for you: -

ADSL - Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line – although it says it’s digital it comes all the way from the exchange on the copper cable phone line that is being switched off. Only one of our members is currently stuck with this and when it’s turned off he will not even be able to get broadband unless BT catch up before then.

FTTC – is fibre to a cabinet in the street and then copper wire from there to the house. The broadband part of this will still work after the switch off but if you are using an analogue phone then the phone will not work.

FTTP – a fibre line (sometimes called cable) runs all the way inside your house.

Slide 12

To keep a landline will I need new equipment? If on ADSL then YES

Slide 13

If I’m already using Virgin Media – will I need new equipment? 

Well going back to earlier on if your plug is like this and your socket like this then YES.

BUT If the plug on the end of your telephone is like either of these NO.

Slide 14

Once you have to change but want to keep your old landline number you have 2 options.

Either buy some new phones that will connect to broadband like these.

Or

Slide 15

And here we go with those acronyms again. 

It just means Analogue Telephone Adaptor and it converts the digital signal back to analogue.

You plug the broadband (ethernet) cable into the blue socket and then the white connector into the green one. Your old style phone will then plug into white connector. These cost as little as £25 or  £48 for the one shown. But I paid £72 for the one shown from Andrews & Arnold because it came ready to use rather than having to spend a couple of hours (or more) trying to figure how to set it up myself.

A final word on phones: -

If your very proud of the fact that your phone is donkey’s years old you need to check whether it only works on the 3g signal because that is being turned off by the end of this year after which 3g phones will not work.