Before
Documented before we book
RAMS issued within 48 hours. Permit applications, inductions, escort requirements and DBS evidence submitted in the format the facility requires, not the format we prefer.
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Data centres & colocation
In a live hall, there is no second attempt.
Colocation floors, enterprise rooms and edge sites. Escorted or unescorted, permit-driven, out of hours, with a method statement that survives the site induction rather than one written to get past it. We work to the hall's rules, not to ours, and we leave the aisle cleaner than we found it.
- RAMS turnaround48 hours*
- Out of hours & nightsAvailable*
- Escorted or unescortedEither
- DBS-checked engineersYes
- ECS-carded operativesYes
- Electrical capabilityIn house, NICEIC
- Photographic as-left recordEvery visit
- Geographic coverageNationwide
* Indicative service statements. Free survey and design, quotation and RAMS turnaround, out-of-hours availability and warranty availability apply within our normal operating area and are subject to survey findings, site access and our standard terms and conditions of sale. They are not a contractual commitment unless confirmed in writing.
01 · Scope of works
What we are asked to do, and what we actually deliver.
- Cabinet build and deploymentSupplied where required, delivered, positioned, bolted, bonded, PDU fitted, blanked, earthed and labelled. Wall-mounted and floor-standing enclosures to IEC 60297 geometry. Flight cases and packaging removed on the same visit — not left in the aisle for somebody else to deal with.
- Structured cabling and cross connectsCopper and fibre between cabinets, rows and meet-me rooms. Cross connects ordered, run, tested and recorded against your patching schedule, with the schedule returned updated.
- Pre-terminated trunk and MTP / MPOFactory-terminated and factory-tested assemblies to remove hours from a live floor. Polarity verified on site before any transceiver is fitted, and recorded.
- Cold and hot aisle containmentRoof, door and blanking systems installed to seal the aisle properly, so cooling expenditure produces thermal separation rather than the appearance of it.
- Migrations, moves and decommissioningPhased hall migrations with a defined rollback position at every stage. Decommissioned copper and fibre stripped, weighed and disposed of with a certificate.
- UPS, power supplies and distributionRack and room-scale UPS supplied, installed and commissioned, classified to BS EN IEC 62040-3:2021, with dedicated circuits, distribution, PDU and metering delivered under the group's NICEIC certification and certificated to BS 7671.
- Remote hands and reactive supportScheduled and on-call attendance for patching, port turn-ups, fault isolation and physical-layer diagnosis, under an agreed response obligation.
Standards framework
Data centre works are governed by a different standards set. We name it.
Facility infrastructure is addressed by BS EN 50600 and its international equivalent ISO/IEC 22237, which set out design, availability classification, physical security and operational process requirements for data centre facilities and infrastructures. The cabling itself is designed to BS EN 50173-5 (cabling for data centre spaces) and installed to BS EN 50174-2.
Where a facility works to an availability class, or to a client standard such as ANSI/TIA-942, we build to that classification and evidence conformity in the handover record rather than asserting it in a covering email.
What we will refuse
We will decline a window we do not believe is achievable, and we will tell you why before you have committed to it internally. A contractor that agrees to an impossible outage window is not being commercially accommodating; it is transferring the failure risk onto your change board.
02 · Site discipline
How we turn up.
Facility managers do not remember which contractor terminated the fibre. They remember which contractor left packaging in the aisle, propped a fire door, or turned up without the right permit and burned a booked window. Site discipline is the whole of the commercial relationship in a data centre.
During
Contained and clean
Cutting and stripping done at the designated area. Hot works permits where required. No packaging in aisles, no propped doors, no unattended tooling, no drilling without written approval.
Change
Rollback at every stage
Live works are phased with a defined and tested rollback position. If a stage cannot be completed inside the window, we roll back rather than run over and hope.
After
Recorded before we leave
Photographic as-left record of every cabinet and aisle touched. Patching schedule returned updated. Waste removed and weighed. Certificate of disposal where copper has been recovered.
03 · Media selection in the hall
The pre-terminated argument, made honestly.
Pre-terminated trunk carries more material cost and less of our labour. Field termination carries more of our labour and less material cost. On a greenfield hall with a generous programme, field termination is frequently the better commercial decision. On a live floor with a four-hour window, it almost never is.
We will model both against your actual programme and present the comparison. Where field termination wins, we will say so, even though it is the option that suits us less on a fixed price. The reason is straightforward: we would rather hold the framework than win the variation.
| Consideration | Pre-terminated | Field terminated |
|---|---|---|
| Time on live floor | Hours | Days |
| Material cost | Higher | Lower |
| Factory test evidence | Supplied | Site tested only |
| Length tolerance | Fixed at order | Adjustable |
| Late design change | Costly | Absorbed |
| Best fit | Live halls, tight windows, repeatable rows | Greenfield, uncertain layout, long programme |
Cat8 — where it is and is not correct
Category 8.1 and 8.2 (Class I and Class II) support 25G and 40G over a channel limited to approximately 30 metres. That is a top-of-rack and end-of-row proposition inside a data hall. It is not a building horizontal solution, and any proposal that offers it as one has misunderstood the standard.
04 · Commercial engagement
Three ways facilities engage us.
Project
Defined scope, fixed price
Cabinet deployment, row builds, containment programmes, migrations and decommissioning. Priced against a labour plan and a materials schedule that you receive, not a lump sum with no breakdown.
- Labour plan and materials list issued with the price
- Window feasibility assessed and stated honestly
- Rollback position defined per phase
Retained
Remote hands & call-off
An agreed response obligation with a rate card for patching, port turn-ups, cross connects, fault isolation and physical-layer diagnosis. Suited to operators carrying multiple client estates in one facility.
- Named response times, agreed in the contract
- Fixed rate card, no call-out padding
- Every attendance documented and photographed
Sub-contract
Behind an integrator or operator
We deliver the physical layer under your brand, on your paperwork, to your client. Non-solicitation and confidentiality signed before we quote, without exception and without negotiation on the principle.
- Unbranded vans and engineer badging on request
- Test results issued on your template
- Full PQQ, insurance and accreditation pack supplied
Next step
Tell us the facility and the window.
We will return a labour plan, a materials list and a price — and we will tell you plainly if we believe the window is too short to do it properly.