There were no surprises in the latest Ofcom enumeration of voice, broadband and mobile services in the United Kingdom. Simply, the story is “broadband and mobile up, voice down.”

U.K. fixed telephony services generated £2.1 billion in retail revenues in the fourth quarter of 2012, £93 million (4.2 percent) less than in the fourth quarter of 2011.

There were 33.1 million fixed lines at the end of the fourth quarter of 2012, 107,000 (0.3 percent) less, year over year, but up 135,000 (0.4 percent) compared to the third quarter of 2012.

There were 25.1 billion minutes of fixed-originated calls in the fourth quarter of 2012, 1.9 billion minutes (7 percent) less, year over year, Ofcom says.

There were 22.2 million U.K. residential and small or mid-sized business fixed broadband connections at the end of the fourth quarter of 2012, 1.7 million (8.5 percent) more than there had been a year previously. 

“Other” connections, largely synonymous with fiber to premises connections, reached 1.1 million, at 5.1 percent of total connections, up two percent, year over year.

Retail revenues generated by mobile telephony increased by 0.8 percent in 2012 to £15.2 billion. Data services grew by 16.8 percent, year over year.

But 2012 also became the second consecutive year of decline in mobile call volumes, with a decline of 1 percent, slightly smaller than the annual decline in 2011 of 1.1 percent.

Mobile-to-fixed and mobile-to-mobile voice call volumes have each declined for two consecutive years. Mobile-to-fixed calling declined 2 percent while mobile-to-mobile calling dropped 0.7 percent, year over year.

In the fourth quarter of 2012, the volume of SMS messages sent was 6.4 percent lower, year over year.  

In 2011, slightly less than half of U.K. households were able to buy broadband access from a cable operator, essentially Virgin Media (News - Alert). But Virgin Media is important because it already sells access at speeds to 120 Mbps.

Other areas of the U.K. might get speeds of 24 Mbps or 40 Mbps from Openreach, though some locations will have fiber-to-home connections that run faster.