Glossary

General

Building Digital UK (BDUK) - The programme within the Department for Science, Innovation
& Technology responsible for digital infrastructure programmes in the UK.

Better Broadband for Oxfordshire (BBFO) - The Better Broadband for Oxfordshire programme, was a partnership between Oxfordshire County Council, BT and BDUK. The contract with BT was signed in 2013 and had 3 phases running until 2020 and has now successfully been completed with over 90,000 premises connected to superfast broadband. Read more here: Better Broadband for Oxfordshire | Digital Infrastructure Programme

Businesses in Rural Oxfordshire (BiRO) - The EAFRD funded contracts with BT and Airband delivered ultrafast broadband to rural businesses and nearby residences in Oxfordshire. These contracts started in October 2019 and completed in August 2022, with 777 businesses delivered and a further 818 residential properties also connected. Read more here: Businesses in Rural Oxfordshire (BiRO) | Digital Infrastructure Programme

Cross-border premises - Premises that are connected to exchanges located outside of Oxfordshire. The Government is managing exchange areas on county boundaries at a national level to ensure fairness and that no areas fall through the gaps.

Rural

Digital Infrastructure Programme (DIP) - Oxfordshire County Council's Digital infrastructure Programme Programme aims to support the residents, businesses and communities across Oxfordshire by working with commercial operators, central government and running intervention projects, the programme helps to facilitate digital infrastructure delivery and improve access to broadband, mobile and public access to Wi-Fi services across the county.

Next Generation Access (NGA) - refers to higher performance technologies than broadband provided over traditional copper networks. NGA is fibre optic and can provide higher download and upload speeds to support access line speeds above 30Mbps. Examples of NGA include Fibre to the Premise (FTTP), Fibre to the Cabinet (FTTC) and Fixed Wireless Access.

State Aid - This is the mechanism to ensure that public funds are only applied to areas that are deemed not commercially viable, i.e. areas where no commercial provider indicated they have coverage or have plans to operate coverage.

Universal Service Obligation (USO) – From the 20th March 2020, you will have the legal right to request an upgraded broadband connection if you can’t access a download speed of 10Mbps and an upload speed of 1Mbps. This requirement has been specified by Ofcom the independent regulator, which is based on an average family. The request for an upgraded connection can be made to BT and you do not need to be an existing customer to apply – just visit their website to check if you could be eligible and for further details.

To note, the scheme has recently changed such that applications can be made jointly with other local premises. This means the aggregated funding is more likely to cover the cost of upgrading the infrastructure.

Visit BT’s website: Universal Service Obligation (USO)

West Oxfordshire broadband programme - From 2016, West Oxfordshire District Council ran their own independent broadband programme. This completed in 2022. Read more: https://www.gigaclear.com/west-oxfordshire

Technical

Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line (ADSL) - Form of DSL connection that uses frequencies on regular, copper telephone lines that aren’t taken up by voice calls. It is possible to receive up to 24Mbps download over ADSL, however upload speeds could be variable due to the condition of the wires, distance and any noise or interference on the telephone line.

Cabinet capacity - When a new FTTC cabinet is installed, Openreach know how many properties will be connected and they also make an assumption regarding how many connections will be taken-up. If the take-up is higher than anticipated, Openreach will need to add additional capacity by installing new connection cards into the cabinet. Openreach actively monitor each cabinet and will automatically order the new cards, so in many cases, the upgrade will happen before the cabinet reaches capacity. On occasion however, take-up may be higher than expected and can also happens very quickly, which means the cabinet will reach capacity quicker and then cause a short delay before new orders can be taken.

Fibre to the Cabinet (FTTC) - is a fibre connection from the exchange to the local on-street cabinet, then a copper connection from the cabinet to end premise. This is also known as VDSL (see above).

Fibre-to-the-Premise (FTTP) - is a 100% fibre connection all the way from the telephone exchange to the end premise.

FTTP on Demand (FoD) - This is a fibre connection to your premise with speeds up to 330Mbps and would be built to order at a cost to yourself if your premise is already in a Fibre-to-the-Cabinet exchange area and served by FTTC. When you order the service, Openreach will plan and provide details of the cost to install the product to your premise.

Full Fibre - Full-fibre broadband uses fibre optic cables to connect the exchange directly to each premises (also known as FTTP). Full-fibre connections are capable of download and upload speeds over 1 Gbps. It is currently the fastest and most reliable broadband technology.

Gigabit Capable - any technology that can deliver 1 gigabit per second. (1 Gpbs is equal to 1000 Mbps). 1 Gbps allows a high definition film to be downloaded in under one minute. This definition also applies to the Virgin Media DOCSIS 3.1 network.

Internet Service provider (ISP) - any company that providers broadband services to homes and businesses.

Very-high Digital Subscriber Line (VDSL) - An improved version of ADSL technology that provides faster upload and download speeds and is a product available from the Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC). VDSL can be up to five times faster for download and ten times faster for upload speeds.

Wayleave - a legal document granting permission to access or cross privately owned land. The Digital Infrastructure Programme is now delivering to very rural areas, which can become problematic with highways (publicly owned land) being less suitable or not available; this can cause delays.

Coverage Map related

Classification - R = Residential, NR = Non-residential. This classification comes from the AddressBase Premium dataset supplied by Ordnance Survey, under license.

UPRN - Unique Premises Reference Number. Every premises has a a unique reference number allocated AddressBase Premium dataset supplied by Ordnance Survey, under license.

Experiencing Issues/Complaints

Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) scheme - If your provider fails to repair a fault by when they say they will or you are unhappy with how long it is taking, you should follow their formal complaints procedure. Details should be available through their website or customer services. If your problem is still unresolved after eight weeks you can submit your complaint to an independent Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) scheme. Read more here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/alternative-dispute-resolution-for-consumers/alternative-dispute-resolution-for-consumers

OFCOM - Ofcom is the regulator and competition authority for the UK communications industries. Ofcom.org.uk