Touching Bt's Line Before The Master Socket

[breff]

I was asked to protect a BT cable that was running at reachable height by disconnecting at a junction box, running through conduit and reconnecting. This is the incoming line to the house from the overhead pole. I refused and seem to remember being told that it is illegal to touch anything up to and including the A and B terminals on the NTE5.

Can anyone confirm and if possible link to the information.

Thanks

Glenn

[Lectrician]

It is BT's property and you agree by contract not to tamper.

In saying this, it goes on everyday.

If you know what you are doing they will never know, and likely not give two hoots.

If you make a bodge or use non standard kit, then as soon as there is a fault on the line you will have issues.

There is also many different grades of equipment and cable, for example all CW1308 cable you buy will conform to the CW1308 spec, but some cable is far superior in quality to others, and clearly noticeable to most people. BT use the top end of the market when it comes to equipment and cables.

[Rulland]

Hi Glenn, Yeh I think we've all heard the 'mutterings' from BT that we shouldn't touch the incomer as it's 'illegal'!!.

I think they basically say 'if someone else has messed with it and you have a fault then we can charge you exponentially more than we currently do to put it right'!.

At the end of the day the customer is liable from the master/NT5 onwards-I see no problem with making a cable safer as far as vandalism or whatever goes as long as you get it right-but lets face it 2 cores used normally in a domestic-who can get it wrong?.

There is a fallacy in electrics that you can't touch the electricity boards main fuse/seal-but how the hell do you change the fuse or the consumer unit etc without breaking the seal and removing their fuse-IMHO as long as the board can see that no attempt has been made to illicit illegal power thay are OK with it-I mean it's pretty obvious why it's been tampered with if a newly installed dis board is in place-and I've had no probs with them thus far!.

Going back to the BT scenario again IMHO you'd make a better job of mechanically supporting/keeping the cable neat and tidy etc than most BT engineers-and as for sky I laugh out loud Joe Bloggs hamster could do a better job!.

I've actually taken a main BT overhead out and rerouted it in a better way at a customers request, had no comebacks or questions from wholesale.

As for the 'law' side of things I'll try to find out more for my benefit and the likes of you.

Regards.

Richard.

[Guest old-hand]

Sky effort next door

[Rulland]

They're getting better then lol..............................

[magpye]

Sky effort next door

That's no different to having your bog (can I say that?) standard TV aerial thrown over the roof

[Guest RJBsec]

Done it for years but I actually 'phoned them a few years ago as I had a new porch fitted at my own house and I had to disconnect and re-route the incoming line back from outside and into the house - they said it was fine, no warnings, cautions, advice or anything.

[antinode]

I reckon it depends on any future BT engineers that attend.

You may get some jobsworth come out to a line fault in the future, spot your handiwork and condem it just for the sake of being an //.B.W.F.//.

I have seen galv capping used outside in this situation but it does look bloody awful to be honest.