Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, whether (a) Ofcom and (b) the Ombudsman has the power to investigate complaints in respect of Openreach.

Openreach does not have direct relationships with residential consumers. Consumer complaints should, in the first instance, be made to the communications company that provides the retail services and they will take them up with Openreach where necessary. If a customer is still unhappy after they have made a complaint to their provider, they can ask CICAS or the Ombudsman Services to investigate.

Ofcom does not handle individual complaints but it monitors and analyses complaints and, where it sees evidence of recurring harm, it can take action. This process enables Ofcom to track the types of issue that affect consumers most and any providers that appear to be responsible for causing harm.

In addition, Ofcom sets Openreach quality of service standards, which it is raising following its review of the Wholesale Local Access (WLA) market. Ofcom will monitor Openreach’s performance against these standards closely and step in if these are not met.