Power Cuts in North-West England and associated telecom matters.

[Xenophon PCDGS]

One power cut at 2215 last night and another at 0500 this morning, both fortunately of short duration. I am on the Electricity North-West list of "Priority" customers on account of my medical conditions and age (79) and when power was restored, I received a telephone call at home from a member of their staff asking how I was managing and offering advice. I now know to ring 105 in future if more cuts occur on the mobile phone that I had to buy, when I was switched over to Digital Voice, which does not work in such emergencies.

Has any other website member suffered power cuts in the last 24 hours?

 

[Adwy]

When you were switched to Digital Voice you should have been offered a battery back-up. This is commonly known as an uninterruptible power supply (UPS), although BT/EE customer-facing may not be familiar with this term.

You are fortunate to have a good local mobile service; we lack that and so insisted upon the UPS, which I must test again today. And, of course, the mobile service may also fail in a power cut…

But good luck with the UPS, it can help in these circumstances.

 

[AndrewE]

When you were switched to Digital Voice you should have been offered a battery back-up. This is commonly known as an uninterruptible power supply (UPS), although BT/EE customer-facing may not be familiar with this term.

You are fortunate to have a good local mobile service; we lack that and so insisted upon the UPS, which I must test again today. And, of course, the mobile service may also fail in a power cut…

But good luck with the UPS, it can help in these circumstances.

Has anyone got any recommendations for a UPS to run just the home hub and phone? Not being vulnerable I need to do this for myself, as my Givenergy pv and battery stop working if we lose the internet.
When the pv was being fitted the electrician lent us one about the size of a brick for the 2 plugs we needed to keep live, but I can't see anything like it in a quick online search.

 

[Adwy]

Hmm, have a look at Reillo UPS. They are based in Wrexham. I have no brief for them, but they do appear to have a wide range, many at a more modest price.

 

[TheTallOne]

Has anyone got any recommendations for a UPS to run just the home hub and phone? Not being vulnerable I need to do this for myself, as my Givenergy pv and battery stop working if we lose the internet.
When the pv was being fitted the electrician lent us one about the size of a brick for the 2 plugs we needed to keep live, but I can't see anything like it in a quick online search.

I’ve got a BackUPS 650 (APC I think), bought from Amazon.

It runs my modem, router and raspberry Pi in the event of a power cut. Usually sits at 1-2% load and last for about an hour in a power cut.

With regards to your GivEnergy system, I got my installer to wire up a special socket to the EPS output of the inverter - so I can use the stored power from the battery in a power cut.

 

[AndrewE]

I’ve got a BackUPS 650 (APC I think), bought from Amazon.

It runs my modem, router and raspberry Pi in the event of a power cut. Usually sits at 1-2% load and last for about an hour in a power cut.

With regards to your GivEnergy system, I got my installer to wire up a special socket to the EPS output of the inverter - so I can use the stored power from the battery in a power cut.

Thanks, I'll follow that up.
Re the inverter, I have now found the installation manual online which explains that, I'll follow it up.
Thanks again.
A

 

[bearhugger]

One power cut at 2215 last night and another at 0500 this morning, both fortunately of short duration. I am on the Electricity North-West list of "Priority" customers on account of my medical conditions and age (79) and when power was restored, I received a telephone call at home from a member of their staff asking how I was managing and offering advice. I now know to ring 105 in future if more cuts occur on the mobile phone that I had to buy, when I was switched over to Digital Voice, which does not work in such emergencies.

Has any other website member suffered power cuts in the last 24 hours?

We had a short power cut over in Middlesbrough one morning last week about 8am. Woken up by the house alarm going off. We got a text, also being a priority case with our medical conditions, once power was restored.

 

[najaB]

I know this is possibly beyond the scope of this thread, but I can't resist pointing out that this is one more reason to consider battery storage alongside solar. My parents live in the Caribbean and the electrical system, while significantly better than it was, is still less reliable than ours in the UK.

After a storm in 2021 took out the mains power supply for ten days I decided to get them set up with both solar and battery storage. The inverter powers the lighting and priority sockets (fridge, freezer, internet, tv, phone, etc) with enough battery to get them through the night and the battery recharges the next day. Since I set it up there have been a number of extended blackouts that they didn't even realise had happened until I mentioned it to them (I've got remote system monitoring).

As a happy aside, they typically only use around 2% grid power for those circuits though that wasn't the primary motivation.

 

[TheTallOne]

Thanks, I'll follow that up.
Re the inverter, I have now found the installation manual online which explains that, I'll follow it up.
Thanks again.
A

No probs.

We had a short power cut over in Middlesbrough one morning last week about 8am. Woken up by the house alarm going off. We got a text, also being a priority case with our medical conditions, once power was restored.

Yeah, my house alarm used to do that. Battery dead by any chance? I got a new one via trade sparky website. Fitted it myself too (I'm not the best at such stuff, but it worked!!!)

 

[bearhugger]

Yeah, my house alarm used to do that. Battery dead by any chance? I got a new one via trade sparky website. Fitted it myself too (I'm not the best at such stuff, but it worked!!!)

Probably a dead battery, it's been in for 15 odd years! Is the battery in the unit on the outside wall?

 

[najaB]

Probably a dead battery, it's been in for 15 odd years! Is the battery in the unit on the outside wall?

It's usually in the electronics box that's inside, since it being outside would make it vulnerable to the bad guys.

 

[bearhugger]

It's usually in the electronics box that's inside, since it being outside would make it vulnerable to the bad guys.

Of course, that makes perfect sense & obvious when you think about it! Thanks, I will have to see what type of battery I need before ordering.

 

[dgl]

Might be one in the bell box too so that if someone was to cut the wires to it it will still go off.
The one in the main unit will usually be a small sealed 12V lead-acid of something around 4-7Ah, be aware that some systems may require a special code to allow the unit to be opened without setting off the alarm (and/or in some cases to reset any tamper warnings).

 

[Energy]

Has anyone got any recommendations for a UPS to run just the home hub and phone? Not being vulnerable I need to do this for myself, as my Givenergy pv and battery stop working if we lose the internet.
When the pv was being fitted the electrician lent us one about the size of a brick for the 2 plugs we needed to keep live, but I can't see anything like it in a quick online search.

What power adapter does the phone use?

Any UPS will work fine - APC/Schneider, Eaton, and CyberPower are the most common brands.

You can get a DC UPS which is often quite small, like the Eaton 3S, but your device will need to take a DC barrel input.

I now know to ring 105 in future if more cuts occur on the mobile phone that I had to buy, when I was switched over to Digital Voice, which does not work in such emergencies.

Contact BT. If you meet their requirements to classify you as vulnerable, they will give you a battery backup unit free of charge.

On another note, BT really should give a backup unit to anyone who asks. At BT's scale, they aren't expensive.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Is it BT's plan to switch over all their domestic customers onto EE and only retain their remaining business/commercial customer base?

 

[najaB]

Is it BT's plan to switch over all their domestic customers onto EE and only retain their remaining business/commercial customer base?

I really don't know what BT's plans are these days. During the period of 2008-2015 it seemed that they actually had a plan (as evidenced by the steady rise in company value) but these days it seems like nobody has a hand on the tiller. I blame Gavin Patterson.

 

[Energy]

Is it BT's plan to switch over all their domestic customers onto EE and only retain their remaining business/commercial customer base?

Eventually. BT Consumer and EE are the same company, and they have the same customer support team, most advice is interchangeable between the brands to be honest.

All ISPs have to provide a battery backup to vulnerable customers.

I really don't know what BT's plans are these days. During the period of 2008-2015 it seemed that they actually had a plan (as evidenced by the steady rise in company value) but these days it seems like nobody has a hand on the tiller. I blame Gavin Patterson.

There is some movement from BT Group, notably the new 1.2Gbps and 1.8Gbps faster speeds are only available. They've also updated their TV offering to be only EE TV, the TV product itself is good but it's still bundled weirdly with EE TV + BT Broadband, and EE TV + EE Broadband both being options.

BT is more complicated in that it has more special products to deal with, like the 10Mbps USO, but I still don't see why they didn't simultaneously launch EE TV and announce that all new customers but order with EE.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Is it true that some domestic customers as part of a package have EE broadband, but have to have the BT email system?

 

[Energy]

Is it true that some domestic customers as part of a package have EE broadband, but have to have the BT email system?

Yes, EE never provided emails and neither BT Consumer or EE do for new customers. BT customers who are transferred over keep access to the old btinternet email but on the old BT login.

 

[infobleep]

When you were switched to Digital Voice you should have been offered a battery back-up. This is commonly known as an uninterruptible power supply (UPS), although BT/EE customer-facing may not be familiar with this term.

You are fortunate to have a good local mobile service; we lack that and so insisted upon the UPS, which I must test again today. And, of course, the mobile service may also fail in a power cut…

But good luck with the UPS, it can help in these circumstances.

Battery backup is only available for those in areas of no mobile reception and ilmayhe poor reception too. They also need to be vulnerable.

I managed to get one for my parents as my farther is registered blind.

It can only be done via a phone call and whej i did it aftwr Christmas, the person, although trying to be helpful, hadn't heard of the scheme.

They also tried to set my parents up on EE as BT and EE are merging but BT had a better off at Christmas which the EE system couldn't match. Thus they got my parents set up with BT with a discount off their bill. They couldn't match the online only BT offer either, hence the money off to reflect the difference.

 

[najaB]

They also tried to set my parents up on EE as BT and EE are merging...

Minor point of order: EE has been part of the BT group since 2015-ish. Basically what they're doing now is consolidating the brands.

 

[swt_passenger]

It's usually in the electronics box that's inside, since it being outside would make it vulnerable to the bad guys.

Two batteries in my system. One to deal with mains failure, and one in the bell box - there to sound the alarm if the whole cable to the bell box is cut. It’s referred to as a “self activated bell” or SAB.

 

[infobleep]

Minor point of order: EE has been part of the BT group since 2015-ish. Basically what they're doing now is consolidating the brands.

Thanks for the correction. The consolidation is obviously very complicated, given at Christmas Time BT had an offer that EE didn't and EE couldn't match it.