'A real danger' Landline users voice fears over digital switch

Rural residents reveal failings in backup plans, as campaigners call for deadline to be extended from 2027 to 2030. Zoe Wood reports

- Zoe Wood reports

Every time there is a power failure I lose all means of communication with the outside world,” says Robert Dewar of life in a remote village in the Scottish Highlands since the landlines were transferred from the old copper cable network to broadband connections.

Blackouts also knock out the village’s mobile phone signal. “Our most recent power cut lasted for 42 hours,” says Dewar.

The interruption outlasted his five-hour backup battery. “If had had a heart attack there is damn all I could have done about it, except compose myself, say my prayers, and await the outcome.”

Dewar was among the more than 100 readers who contacted us with their experiences as the old infrastructure - the public switched telephone network (PSTN) - used to make calls, is replaced.

The copper cables are being replaced with a “digital voice” service that uses a broadband connection.

The overhaul of the network has been a huge undertaking, but is now in its final year with roughly 3.2m homes (about a fifth of the original number) still connected to the PSTN, which is due to be switched off in January 2027.

For many, the switchover simply involves plugging the phone handset into the broadband router instead of the socket on the wall.

However, for vulnerable Britons, or those living in remote locations such as Dewar, without a mobile signal, it can be much more complex to make sure they are not cut off from the outside world when something goes wrong.

In its 2025 Connected Nations report, Ofcom predicted the pace of customer migrations would increase this year to meet the approaching deadline. To date telecoms providers have focused on the easiest homes to switch, and the communications regulator acknowledged it is “likely that more complex customers will make up a larger proportion of the remaining PSTN customers”.