In a recent announcement, BT Wholesale said that customers signing up for fibre-based broadband connectivity via BT's country-wide rollout may end up getting get download speeds as low as 5Mbps.

ISP customers of BT's wholesale division were Wednesday informed by the company that instead of the current minimum speed of 15Mbps for the fibre-to-the-cabinet FTTC products, they could resell the company's new FTTC service with a minimum assured downstream speed of 5Mbps.

BT Wholesale said in a statement: "Consumers and businesses that have previously been unable to order fibre broadband over BT's network because their line was unable to support the minimum speed of 15Mbps will now able to do so via their ISP."

According to BT Wholesale, the move to lower the minimum download speed threshold will enable wholesale customers - like TalkTalk - to sell more end users services that can be described as `fibre.'

Noting that the move was largely a result of customer demand, a BT spokeswoman told ZDNet UK that customers who subscribe to the slower product will be counted as `fibre' customers.

The spokeswoman further added that BT Retail will not itself be selling the new FTTC services with a 5Mbps minimum speed under the Infinity brand; and, hence, such services would not reach the up-to-40Mbps speeds offered by Infinity.