Telecommunications Adjudicator update for January 2026

At the end of January 2026, the number of unbundled lines stands at 3.46 million. There are 1.06 million WLR lines and the number of telephone numbers using CPS is 0.37 million.  *

The following is an update on the principal areas of project activity being led by OTA2.  

Passive Infrastructure Access

Build demand remains flat and operational performance remains at a good level. There continues to be increased activity in the customer connection space as CPs leverage their built networks.

Unauthorised Use (UU): The contract changes are now in place. Openreach have provided CPs with their data packs showing ‘signs of life’ where NoIs have expired. CPs are reminded that the grace period for declaring any UU ends at the end of March and they should be getting on with informing Openreach as quickly as possible if they have any undisclosed UU.

Joint Site Visits have come under renewed focus as there have been an increasing number of failures being reported. Openreach are gathering information and a new work stream is being kicked off.

Incident & Planned Works Management: Renewed focus on information flow when an incident occurs and the impact that the recovery is having on CPs being able to manage customer expectations for recovery of service. The JSV workstream will also cover incident information.

Beyond Build: The outline draft of a framework for managing pole top capacity has been shared with CPs and Openreach for which we are awaiting comment.  

Other areas of interest:

• Health & Safety and good working practices
• Connecting Customers

Ethernet

Overall performance remains strong, although the order profile is subdued—approximately 15% lower year-on-year. The workstack has fallen well below c14.5k, which introduces challenges around fluidity and impacts reporting.

Changes to the Order Handling Desk have been initiated bringing back an element of direct order management. CPs have reported some challenges in getting the correct response from the desk, it is still early days in the changeover, Openreach are monitoring and reviewing learning.

Areas of Interest:

EAD2: Solid progress, with trial orders beginning to flow.

Exchange Exit: Most major CPs have signed up for the commercial offer. Openreach have run a session looking at lessons learned so far from the pilot exchanges and CPs are being taken through the detail. There is more learning to go as the trial sites wind down to the final circuits.  

Copper and Fibre

The Business IWG initiative is continuing focused on improvement of business customer orders efficiency and experience, however, this is being expanded to adopt the approach deployed successfully for the KCI2 Assure improvement activity with wider support and engagement across Openreach

The discussions to agree the 2026/27 targets for the FTTP customer experience metrics appear close to resolution and agreement. It is hoped these will conclude during February. CPs also requested that Openreach introduce a RAG status supporting the measures. Openreach have agreed to this, and discussions are ongoing to define the parameters.

Openreach have commenced a Proof of Concept covering pre-emptive FTTP repair incidents and PEWs where Openreach will communicate directly with those customers who have been affected advising them of the cause and providing updates on progress/closure.

All-IP Steering Group

Openreach deployed its UK WLR Stop Sell in September 2023 with limited exemptions, permitting orders of WLR lines in scenarios where the equivalent All-IP product or product variant were either not yet available, or not fully consumed across the supply chain. These exemptions were removed in March 2025. Industry will however be able to place WLR3 orders in exceptional circumstances to support CNI and vulnerable customers. However, Openreach planned to withdraw these exceptions during 2025 but are yet to update on any new timescale.

There are approximately 2.7m WLR lines remaining, with a run rate of reductions of 44k per week. A run rate of circa 52k per week is required to reach zero by January 2027.  Business lines are proving particularly problematic and are further behind the required run rate than residential, which is an issue that has been flagged by OTA2 for some time. With both PDPL (SOTAP) and prove Telecare now being made available, Openreach consider it has provided all of the migration journeys to allow CPs to progress with migrating their customer PSTN bases.  SOGEA migration special offers have also been launched plus Openreach has relaxed FTTP Priority Exchange Stop Sell rules to enable bulk migrations from WLR and associated broadband products to either SOGEA or SOTAP in Great Britain but excluding Northern Ireland

Openreach announced its planned emergency-overrun solution (EVAc) for WLR3 lines remaining in January 2027. This is designed to use existing WLR3 processes and to avoid the need for CP system investment. The benefit of their approach is that end customer can maintain their voice service and billing relationship with their CP and requires no end customer intervention. The product will not support broadband or ISDN2/30 customers and is a defeatured and restricted version of the BT Wholesale PDPL product. There will also be a gating process to move across so not all customers who fail to migrate by end-January 2027 will be moved to EVAc.  

Customer Switching

OTA2 continue working closely with several OTS (One Touch Switching) CPs, to identify opportunities that will improve their effective use of OTS for a small number of vulnerable customers who currently do not benefit from this process. Through the co-chairing, with TOTSCo, of the OTS-IPG (Industry Process Group) OTA2 are actively collaborating with the approach to ‘migrate’ CPs between MAPs (Managed Access Providers) and for CPs to undertake a managed exit from the marketplace – with the objective of minimal impacts on in-flight OTS orders for both Gaining and Losing CPs.

The TETP (Tactical Erroneous Transfer Process), available to all registered CPs, continues to register new members, with the process to do so and the circulation of that registry facilitated by OTA2.  TETP documentation is published on the OTA2 website, under Best Practice Guidance – Consumer Switching.  

CPs are also reminded that OTA2 have published several Best Practice Guides for Switching and Working Line Takeover, which offer advice and support for CPs to avoid creating an ‘Erroneous Transfer’ scenario, these can also be found in the same location on the OTA2 website.  

Business Switching

All published documents associated with the Switching for Business process and message specifications can be found on the Gaining Provider Led Business Switching public - FCS website, with the  core document set of Switching for Business documents also published on the OTA2 website, under Best Practice Guidance – Consumer Switching – both sites are free to access without need for registration. Work in this area is now focused on producing a number of Best Practice Guides, to be added to the existing document library and assist CPs in effectively and efficiently use of the Switching for Business process.  

Number Porting

At the January NPCSG (Number Port Process and Commercial Group) A number of actions were taken to investigate further into the use and support of ‘Cancel Other’ against port requests, the exact definition and use of ‘data freeze’ and its impacts on porting support alongside creating a Best Practice for CLoA (Customer Letter of Authority), with dedicated groups already working on these issues.   

Service Levels

Copper and Fibre provision

Openreach FAD (First Available Appointment Date) performance nationally, over the 5-day period ending 31 January 2026 was as follows:      

Notes:

1. MI and SI are Managed-Install and Self-Install orders
2. FTTC is Fibre to the cabinet
3. FTTP is Fibre to the premises
4. SOGEA is Single Order Generic Ethernet Access
5. GFAST is Fibre-base Ultrafast Broadband

Copper repair

  LLU and WLR ‘on time repair’ performance has seen a upward trend for LLU and WLR, achieving a 4-week rolling average of 82.5% and 78.2% respectively, by week ending 30 January 2026. 

* The figures quoted exclude BT downstream connections