BT Group PLC (LSE:BT.A) has ceased sales of copper wire telephone products after nearly a century, as the telco giant bids to scrap traditional landlines entirely in the coming years.
Having initially announced plans to end the use of the analogue system in 2017, BT subsidiary Openreach announced new wholesale line rental contracts would no longer be sold from Tuesday.
“Since the retirement of [the] network was first publicised, we’ve been working closely with providers to migrate their customers onto digital technologies,” the wholesaler said.
Sales of old landlines have already ended in areas covering 4.6 million homes, with 10 million lines needing to be moved to the new digital system by December 2025.
Concern had been raised over the move, given households will either need a broadband connection or mobile phones to make calls under the wholly digital network.
According to regulator Ofcom, millions of households were yet to gain access to the internet when the plans were initially announced, prompting concern that elderly and vulnerable people could become isolated.
However, BT reassured such customers would be kept connected to the system through the likes of handsets that can use both broadband or the mobile network.
“When customers sign up for a new contract - or when they switch, upgrade or re-grade their service via their provider - they'll be moved onto a new digital line rather than an analogue one," the group explained.