Consultation: Copper retirement – conditions under which copper regulation could be completely withdrawn in ultrafast exchanges

We have today published changes to Table 2.2 in Annex 5 of the consultation document. Table 2.2 sets out in detail the impact of our copper retirement proposals on the regulatory conditions imposed on different regulated wholesale services.

On 6 November 2020 we published a further consultation on certain proposed remedies (PDF, 494.8 KB). In this consultation we propose to align the approach we take to controlling charges for FTTC at speeds of 40/10 so that services provided using SOGEA are treated on the same basis as services provided using VULA as an overlay to the existing copper service. This would mean the FTTC 40/10 service provided via SOGEA would be capped at £147.83 in the first year and at CPI-0% from then on, rather than being subject to a fair and reasonable charges obligation. We reflect those proposals in the updated Table 2.2.

We have also taken the opportunity to make small technical amendments to:

• clarify the application of our proposals to new requests for network access in relation to new copper services enabling FTTP and SOG.fast migration in the key and the table;
• clarify references in the key to the table to network access as meaning general or specific network access requirements;
• streamline and standardise references to the requirement to provide network access on fair and reasonable terms, conditions and (unless there is a charge control) charges in the key and table; and,
• clarify the application of our proposals to single order products in the key and the table.

We have updated the consultation document to reflect these changes.