What is SoGEA? Broadband without a phone line, explained for business

If your provider has written to say it’s moving your broadband to SoGEA, the short version is that you keep your broadband, and the old analogue phone line underneath it goes.

For most businesses that’s a straightforward change. The part that catches people out is everything else that was quietly using that phone line.

This guide explains what SoGEA is, how it compares with the FTTC broadband you probably have now and with full fibre, and what to check before the day you move.

Last reviewed 30 October 2026. Written by John McGilveray at Chrome Telecom.

Key takeaways

• SoGEA is broadband with no analogue phone line, so there’s no dial tone at the socket.
• It’s the standard replacement for FTTC where full fibre (FTTP) hasn’t reached your address.
• Speeds match FTTC: up to 80Mbps down and 20Mbps up, less on a long line.
• Alarms, card machines, lift phones and door entry systems may still use the old line. Check them first.

What does SoGEA stand for?

Single Order Generic Ethernet Access. It’s Openreach’s name for the product, and it’s easier than it sounds.

• Single order means one product. For years, business broadband was ordered on top of a phone line, so you had two things on the bill. SoGEA is just the broadband.
• Generic Ethernet Access is Openreach’s wholesale name for its fibre broadband, the service other providers buy and sell on to you.

Openreach runs most of the UK’s local broadband network, and says SoGEA is available to 98.5% of UK premises. You don’t buy from Openreach directly. You buy SoGEA from a provider, such as Chrome, who orders it on Openreach’s network.

How does SoGEA work?

Physically, SoGEA is the same as the FTTC (fibre to the cabinet) broadband most businesses have had for the past decade.

Fibre optic cable runs from the telephone exchange to the green street cabinet. From there, the existing copper line carries the connection the last stretch into your building. The difference is what travels over that copper. With FTTC, the line carries an analogue phone service as well as broadband. With SoGEA, it carries broadband only.

That’s why SoGEA carries on after January 2027 and FTTC doesn’t. It doesn’t depend on the analogue phone network that’s being switched off.

SoGEA vs FTTC

If you’re on FTTC now, moving to SoGEA shouldn’t change your broadband speed. What changes is that the phone service on the line stops.

SoGEA vs FTTP

FTTP (fibre to the premises), or full fibre, runs fibre all the way into your building. There’s no copper, so it’s much faster and doesn’t slow down with distance. Speeds usually start around 100Mbps and go up to 1Gbps or more, with far better upload speeds.

If your address can get FTTP, it’s usually the better choice. Full fibre broadband doesn’t use the traditional phone line at all. SoGEA is the standard option where full fibre hasn’t arrived yet, and it’ll see you through until it does.

Our jargon buster compares SoGEA, FTTP, FTTC, ADSL and leased lines side by side. You can check what your own address can get with our fibre checker.

How fast is SoGEA broadband?

The fastest standard SoGEA service offers up to 80Mbps download and 20Mbps upload. You’ll often see it written as SoGEA 80/20. Openreach’s price list also includes slower options, such as 40/10 and 55/10.

What you actually get depends on the length of the copper line between the street cabinet and your building. Openreach says speeds can start to drop noticeably beyond about 300 to 400 metres from the cabinet. Two businesses on the same road can see quite different speeds, so any quote should be based on your address, not a headline figure.

The upload speed is the one to watch. It’s what carries video calls, cloud backups and calls on a cloud phone system. A small office doing email and Microsoft 365 is usually fine on SoGEA. A larger team on video calls all day may start to feel the 20Mbps limit, and that’s when FTTP or a leased line is worth a look.

What changes when you move to SoGEA?

For the broadband, very little. For anything that used the phone line, quite a lot.

• There’s no phone service on the line. An ordinary phone plugged into the wall socket won’t work. For a single phone, the government’s advice is that the change may be as simple as plugging it into your broadband router instead.
• An engineer may or may not visit. Openreach offers moves to SoGEA both with and without an engineer appointment. Your provider will tell you which your line needs. If an engineer does come, they may fit a newer master socket.
• The number on the line needs a plan. Ordering SoGEA in place of an old phone line stops that line. To keep a number customers use, the move has to include a request to transfer it, called porting.
• You stop paying for an analogue line that you may not have used for calls in years. Openreach has also raised the wholesale price of old phone lines three times in 2026 to encourage people to move.

If you still have ISDN lines running an older office phone system, they’re part of the same change. Openreach says all services on ISDN must move to an internet-based service by January 2027, or they’ll be stopped.

What else is using your phone line?

This is the part that’s easy to miss. Over the years, other equipment may have been connected to your phone line, and some of it won’t work on SoGEA without a change.

Openreach lists the kinds of device to check. Walk round the building and look for anything plugged into a phone socket, or ask whoever maintains it:

• Alarms, including intruder and fire alarms that call a monitoring centre
• Lift phones, the emergency phone inside a lift
• Payment terminals that dial out rather than using broadband or a SIM
• CCTV that sends alerts or footage over the phone line
• Door entry systems that ring a phone
• Telecare and health monitoring equipment, for example in care settings
• Fax machines, if you still have one

Openreach’s longer list also includes gates and barriers, lone worker alarms and building energy systems. Ask the supplier of each one whether it works over broadband, needs a SIM-based alternative or needs replacing. Do this well before your move date, because some suppliers need time to visit.

Can you keep your phone number?

Yes, but not as a traditional landline. With SoGEA there’s no analogue phone service, so your number moves to a phone service that runs over the internet.

For a business, that’s usually a cloud phone system, such as ChromeX. Your number is moved across, a process called porting, and calls then work on desk phones, laptops and mobiles. Some providers also offer a simple digital line through a port on the router for a single phone.

The order matters. Arrange the number transfer as part of the move, so it happens before the old line stops. Ofcom’s rules give business customers at least one month after a switch to ask for their number to be moved, but it’s far safer not to rely on that.

What happens if you haven’t moved by 31 January 2027?

Openreach confirmed in September 2026 that the analogue network closes on 31 January 2027 and that there’s no extension. At that point it estimated about 1.2 million lines were still on the old network, around 350,000 of them at business premises.

Lines that haven’t moved may be transferred to a limited, last-resort phone service that Openreach calls EVAc, short for Emergency Voice and Access Continuity. Openreach says it can’t be ordered in advance and its capacity isn’t unlimited. Lines that can’t move to it will be stopped in stages. Where it’s technically possible, Openreach says it will also keep linked broadband running.

It’s a safety net, not a plan. If your business is still on an analogue line or FTTC, it’s much better to choose your replacement now than to end up on an emergency service.

What about power cuts and 999 calls?

An analogue phone line carried its own power, so a basic phone kept working in a power cut. A broadband connection doesn’t. When the power goes, the router goes off, and so do calls over it.

Ofcom expects providers to offer at least one way to reach the emergency services for at least an hour in a power cut. It must be free for customers who depend on their landline, such as someone with a telecare alarm.

For most businesses, the practical answer is to keep mobiles to hand and forward calls to them if the phone system can’t be reached. If anyone at your premises relies on a landline for emergency calls, talk to your provider about battery backup.

What is a SoGEA adapter?

It isn’t a single product. Openreach and BT don’t sell anything called a SoGEA adapter, and providers use the phrase for different things. Most of the time it means one of these:

• An analogue telephone adapter (ATA). A small box that lets an ordinary phone, or another device that expects a phone line, work over the internet.
• The phone port on your router. Some routers include one, so a single phone can plug in directly.
• A socket faceplate. Some faceplates fitted for SoGEA have a second socket, so the router’s phone output can reach the wiring around the building.

Openreach’s own advice is simply that you may need a router or adapter, and that your provider will supply one if needed. If you’re told you need a SoGEA adapter, ask exactly what it does and which devices it’s for.

Is SoGEA right for your business?

SoGEA suits most small offices that use email, Microsoft 365, cloud applications and a modest number of cloud phone users, at an address where full fibre isn’t available yet.

It’s worth looking further if:

• Full fibre is available. Order FTTP instead. It’s faster and has a longer future ahead of it.
• Uploads matter. Lots of video calls, large file uploads or cloud backups can outgrow 20Mbps.
• The connection can’t go down. A second connection, such as 5G, can keep calls and card payments going if the main line fails.

How Chrome helps

We’ll check what your address can get before we quote, so you’re only offered what your building can actually receive. If FTTP isn’t available yet, we’ll set you up on SoGEA and let you know when full fibre is due, if a date has been published.

We’ll also plan the move around everything that used your phone line. That means moving your numbers to ChromeX before the old line stops, and helping you check alarms, card machines and other equipment with their suppliers. Because we look after the connection, phone system and managed IT together, there’s one plan and one team to call.

Our PSTN switch-off service explains how we review lines, devices and numbers before the January 2027 date.

A sensible place to start

Find your latest broadband bill and look for the product name. If it says FTTC, SoGEA, FTTP or ADSL, you’ll know where you stand. Then list everything in the building that plugs into a phone socket.

If you’d like us to check your address and talk you through the options, check your connection options with our team, or call us on 03333 212 707.