[weesteev]

Just to clarify the caller ID issues that some of you are having...

In ex- Cable and Wireless areas, there are a number of switch sites that are not compatible with caller ID due to issues with street cabinets not having the correct equiment to support the caller ID feature.

The biggest problem now is that this type of equipmet is long out of date and not being installed by Virgin. The other issue is Virgins long anticipated plans to switch to an IP telephony system (last mentioned back in 2006 before the rebrand) which would allow Virgin to provision the same call features (amongst other services) to all franchise areas.

Telewest has teamed up with Ericsson in a bid to enter the fast-growing internet telephony market.

The cable TV provider, now the UK's largest cable operator and a thriving broadband provider, has signed a five-year deal with Ericsson to migrate its existing voice network to one based on VoIP.

The initial phase of the deal focuses on residential customers, who will be offered a voice-over-broadband service using Ericsson's Internet Protocol Multimedia Subsystem technology.

Telewest's phone network will migrate to VoIP using Ericsson's Telephony Softswitch.

Ericsson claimed that the ultimate aim is to provide a cheaper alternative to traditional landline calls, and to save Telewest's running costs.

"Telewest is already seeing the benefits from its investment in its network, " said Jacqueline Hey, UK managing director at Ericsson. "Our technology will provide gains [for Telewest] in network running costs and efficiency."

There is no ETA for this type of upgrade unfortunately but rest assured it will be big news on cableforum when it does happen.

Hope this helps guys.