confused by non-functioning BT master socket

[mp129]

Hello folks,

First let me say I am definitely not the DIY type, so please bear with my ignorance. If not for the recession I'd just pay BT to solve the problem I'm about to outline, but they want £129.99 to fix a problem I didn't cause..

Short story is - we just bought a house. It has four telephone sockets. One master and three others which seem to have been bodged up by some clown (cables running up walls, through the airing cupboard etc).

Only one socket works, and it's not the master.

When I open the master socket (NTE5), there are no wires attached to the faceplate. Nor does the test socket work. I can't ring in to a phone attached to that socket. Nothing. Dead as a dodo.

My question? What's going on? How do I get the master socket working?

Any help much appreciated, but please keep it as simple as possible. I have no knowledge of how this stuff works! Thanks.

 

[Sureitsoff?]

has the line been disconnected at the exchange by bt ie if then previous owner cancelled there contract the line may have been disabled

 

[bernardgreen]

If you have just bought the house then either you either need a new contract with BT ( or some other telephone service provider ) or you need to transfer your existing contract to your new house.

As you have proven that the master socket is dead then to satisfy the new or relocated contract to provide service BT have to get that master socket connected. This should be done at NO charge to you.

 

[plugwash]

How do you know that the socket that works is not the master? master doesn't nessacerally mean NTE5.

Anyway if you want to fix things then the first thing you need to do is map out the wiring, (either by inspection or by testing with a multimeter). Once you have put together a diagram of what cables are where and found where the incoming line is (since you have one socket working it should be pretty easy to follow back from it) you can work out how to modify things to get to the state you want.

 

[cajar]

the master has been bypassed for some reason, either to improve broadband speeds (with just one socket on the circuit) or because the supply has went faulty and been renewed from a different direction, and the nte hasn't been included in the new circuit

 

[mp129]

Thanks for the replies.

I don't think the working socket is the master because it comes through an unprofessional looking hole in the wall, runs across under the front door, through another amateur looking hole into the dining room. The master is in the hallway, as you'd expect in a twenty year old house. The other two extensions look similarly amateur, with cables running up walls, through the airing cupboard etc.

@bernardgreen
We were with BT at our old address, and stayed with them when we moved. I don't know whether we got a new contract or whether they transferred the old one.

Does this really mean that BT have an obligation to provide a working master socket? Even though the previous owner of the house seems to have engaged some cowboy or mate to cobble up extensions everywhere and probably disable the master for some reason?

@sureitsoff?
The line was disconnected for a few days. The previous owner took her number with her and BT allocated us another. When it went live, I discovered only one telephone point worked.

 

[plugwash]

It's a tricky one, they have provided a working phone line terminating on a socket, it's just not terminating where you wanted it to and terminating on something you consider a lashup (and which probablly falls below BT's normal standards but not by much).

Even if you do manage to persude BT it's their problem (which I think you will struggle to do given you are already using the line sucessfully). any new cabling put in by BT won't be hidden in any way and they certainly won't provide more than a single socket.

I still think the first thing you need to do is trace the wiring, figure out what connects to what and draw a diagram. Once you have worked out what you have and what you want we should be able to figure out how best to get you there.

 

[mp129]

Thanks plugwash,

I'll attempt the diagram.

edit: OK I've had a look around and this isn't going to be easy. Cabling everywhere, some of it boxed-in or apparently inside walls or in the loft or the garage.

The dining room has the one working botch-up, plus one of those extensions you buy from DIY stores, with a socket doubler on one end and a box on the other which attaches to a wall and allows a phone to be plugged in. That runs round the room, through the downstairs loo, and apparently up into the airing cupboard then the loft then possibly down into a bedroom. The extension cable is old and brittle and when I plug it in, none of the other sockets start to work.

How does a multimeter work? Would it give me the answers? As I said, I'm not very DIY oriented (I can build computers though.. but that's because I find computers interesting, unlike crawling about in the loft tracing cables).

 

[simonpolly]

If possible follow the incoming cable be it overhead or underground to the first socket it enters and is terminated in ,this is your master socket. Rip the rest out and start again,openreach will go straight to the master socket and tell you that is where their responsibility ends and charge you for the privilege then charge you by the hour for any work after the master.If the first socket it is terminated in has a capacitor in it its the master socket if its starred wired then they should remove/correct this free of charge.

 

[mp129]

I can’t even see where the cable enters the house. It’s certainly not overhead. All I know is that the working socket seems to be connected from inside a small sloping bit of roof over the garage. How it gets into that bit of roof I have yet to discover.

I’ve just crawled behind a filing cabinet to get a closer look at the working one. I had thought it was one bought from a DIY shop, because it’s just a box attached to the wall, unlike the ‘master’ which is set flush into the wall. However, it turns out to have a BT logo on it and a test socket inside it, but no capacitor I can see.

I’m now thinking that the master was originally the flush one in the hall, but that it’s been moved by BT at some point, albeit not very neatly.

The ‘original’ master also has no capacitor. It has 2 pairs of wires, one whose ends are connected to something (blue wire with white bits + white wire with blue bits), and one pair which is not connected (orange wire with white bits + grey wire with orange bits).

I don’t know what you mean by “starred wired”.

 

[cajar]

they're supposed to redo star wiring at no charge but this is specifically where it was bt that done it, back when that was the standard. if they see any DIY/ modifications to the circuit that weren't done by them, then the whole job will be chargeable.

 

[cajar]

I think the previous occupier has had 2 lines into the house, and you're using the master for one of them. the second master downstairs once carried a different number, and is now inactive.

without pictures this is purely guesswork.

 

[SimonH2]

I’ve just crawled behind a filing cabinet to get a closer look at the working one. I had thought it was one bought from a DIY shop, because it’s just a box attached to the wall, unlike the ‘master’ which is set flush into the wall. However, it turns out to have a BT logo on it and a test socket inside it, but no capacitor I can see.

That sounds like an NTE5 if it's got the removable bottom half and a test socket. You won't see a capacitor as it's inside the plastic cover on the back of the main bit you're not supposed to fiddle with.

 

[mp129]

Is an NTE5 always a master socket then? It certainly looks like an NTE5.

Maybe BT can tell me whether the property ever had two lines....

If the socket I'm using turns out to be a valid BT-installed master socket I have another problem. I'm trying to install a community alarm and it works perfectly apart from bringing broadband to a crawl. My best theory was that that was due to the socket not being the master.

Thanks guys. All comments appreciated.

 

[cajar]

nte is a master yes (on rare occasions have found it stuck on as an extension)

try double filtering your alarm.