Try thisfirst.
Five minutes of checks. Fixes most things. Then ring us.
Not a brush-off — we want the calls, the team likes the work — but two-thirds of broadband faults sort with a proper power-cycle and a fresh ethernet cable. Run the seven steps below; if you're still down, ring 0330 043 0056 and tell us which steps you've tried. We'll skip the basics and get into the line diagnostics that need our side.
Average time to clear a fault on the easy steps. Worth doing before you spend 20 minutes on hold somewhere.
Steps 01–03 (power-cycle / read the lights / swap the cable) clear the majority of common router faults. The rest narrow it down so the call is short and surgical.
Seven steps, in order.
Run them top-to-bottom. Most people stop at step 03 because the issue is fixed. If you reach step 07 and still down, ring us — we'll start from where you left off.
Full power-cycle
Pull the power on the router (and the ONT too if you're on FTTP). Wait 60 seconds — let the capacitors fully drain, not just blink off and on. On FTTP, plug the ONT back in first and wait until its lights settle (usually 1–2 mins) before powering the router. On FTTC there's no separate modem — just the router. Fixes 60–70% of 'sudden' broadband faults.
Read the lights
ONT: PON or LOS light should be solid green (not flashing red — that's loss-of-signal, fibre fault). Router: WAN/internet light should be solid (not flashing PPP — that means it can't authenticate). If anything's red or off, you've narrowed the fault to that exact box.
Swap the ethernet cable
The patch lead from ONT → router is the most-handled cable in the house and the cheapest thing to fail. Try a different lead. If you've got cat5e/cat6 spares, use one. Bent connector = 'works sometimes' = nightmare to diagnose. Costs 30 seconds, rules out a £2 fault.
Wired speed test
Plug a laptop directly into a LAN port on the router via ethernet. Run a speed test from the help/speedtest page. If wired is healthy and Wi-Fi is slow → Wi-Fi problem (move closer, swap channel, mesh). If wired is also slow → line problem, ring us with the result.
Wi-Fi sanity check
Move a laptop within 2 metres of the router and re-test. If close-up is fine and far-away isn't, you're hitting Wi-Fi range — not a line fault. Common fixes: move the router off the floor, away from the TV / fishtank / microwave, or add a mesh node halfway across the property.
One device or all devices?
If only one device is broken — phone, laptop, TV — it's that device, not the line. Reboot it. Forget the Wi-Fi network and re-join. If multiple devices are broken in the same way, it's the router or the line.
Check for an outage
Before raising a fault, check the network status page (linked below). Planned works and confirmed outages get posted there in real-time, with ETAs. Saves you a phone call to be told 'yeah, we know, it's back at 2pm'.
What it usually turns out to be.
Quick map from what you're seeing to where the fault is most likely. Helps you go straight to the right step in the checklist above.
No internet at all
Run steps 01–03. If the WAN/internet light won't go green after a power cycle and a fresh cable, ring us — we'll run a line test from our side and see whether sync is even reaching your premise.
Slow speeds
Wired speed test first (step 04). If wired is at expected line rate but Wi-Fi isn't, it's distance / interference / channel congestion. If wired is also slow, it's the line — flag it with the result.
Drops every few hours
Check the router's system log if it has one — look for 'PPPoE LCP timeout' or 'session terminated'. Common causes: MTU set wrong (should be 1492 on PPPoE), or a borderline-failing ONT we'd swap proactively. Flag with timestamps.
Wi-Fi works in some rooms, not others
Pure Wi-Fi propagation issue. Mesh nodes (Eero, Deco, Orbi, UniFi) fix this in 15 minutes. Or wire an access point into a far room with a powerline adapter / ethernet pull. Speed test wired in each room to confirm the line is fine throughout.
Skip the checklist and ring us if…
Some faults aren't worth troubleshooting yourself — pick up the phone.
- WAN/internet light is red, or you can see physical damage to the ONT or cabling.
- A digger or street works has been visible in your road in the last 48 hours.
- A neighbour on the same provider is also off (suggests an area-wide issue).
- Smell of burning, water ingress in the ONT enclosure, or signs of a power surge.
- You've completed steps 01–04 and the issue persists or repeats every few hours.
- You're a vulnerable customer (Ofcom GC C5) — we treat your fault as a priority.
Phone-tree menus. Press 9 to skip everything and head straight to the faults team.
UK team, business hours. Out of hours, leave a message — emergency-service-impacting faults route to on-call.
Stuff people ask while they're trying.
Tinker first. Then we tag in.
Run the seven steps. If you're still down, ring us — tell us what you've already tried and we'll skip the basics.