BT Broadband Capping?

fastwunz

fastwunz

fastwunz

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Joined
12 Jul 2005
Posts
4,046
I recently downloaded 'too' much and received a letter from BT telling me i had gone over my allowance. Ive heard rumours that as a result of this, BT will cap the line speed - I'm only seeing speeds of 50kbps maximum and speedtest is showing a constant speed of 512. I'm sick of it - i have been talking to India for 2 hours today and they have basically done NOTHING - aside form the fact i couldn't understand them!!!!!!!!

I should be getting between 3 - 5meg download speeds. I'm not. And I'm annoyed. Can anyone advise me if this capping thing is real and if so, how do i get it resolved.

thanks
 
Yes, it is real, and the only way to get it resolved is to either literally stop downloading, or leave them.
I chose to leave them and have never looked back. I was with BT for 6 years, but since they changed option 3 to "unlimited" it just went badly downhill. I was also being capped to 20-60kbps speeds, and this was on a line syncing at the full 8128kbps and on an IP profile of 7150.
There have been LOADS of threads about this all over the place. Take a look on the BT Broadband section of the thinkbroadband forums - it is thriving with threads about it. LOADS of us have complained but to no avail.

My advice would be to leave them.

BTW, what option are you on? 1, 2 or 3?

I think the largest thread ever made on thinkbroadband was about the capping by BT, do a search on there forums and you should find it.
Here are some threads I just found;
http://bbs.adslguide.org.uk/showthr...=3063543&page=1&view=expanded&sb=5&o=0&fpart=
http://bbs.adslguide.org.uk/showthr...&Number=3066936&page=1&view=expanded&sb=5&o=0

BTW, I was capped for downloading just 15GB a month and I know others who were capped for downloading even less...
 
the throttling is completely random. some idiots on adslguide makes me laugh. there's actually a few bt fanboys who say we must be imagining our problems because their lines are ok and they're heavy downloaders........ well lucky them. but this problem is very real for lots of people regardless of their usage. i was on option3 - well option4 before it was changed. given that you would think you could at least use your old allowance of 40gb. well i didn't even use half of that in any given month and i was still throttled to hell and back. 12kb/s torrents? even a small torrent takes a day to download.... pathetic. 50-150kb/s http downloads. also crap. on paper you would think that would be fast enough for normal browsing. but it wasn't. i couldn't even stream any video and pages were taking noticeably longer to load.... :mad:

if you're out of contract then leave right now. no point in messing around thinking things are going to get better.
 
well that says it all really then - fortunately i bought the equipment out right from BT for a one off £100 charge so im not in contract - i have run test after test, ive checked the noise levels on my line, my SNR levels etc and all is fine.

I am convinced that i have been capped. Its sickening - is there really no way of having it removed?
 
fastwunz said:
I am convinced that i have been capped. Its sickening - is there really no way of having it removed?
Click to expand...

nope. i very much doubt it it was done specifically to you because you went over your limit. like i said, it's completely random and even people who are extremely light users are being affected. and of course you won't get any help from india. and even if you complain and speak to someone here, there really isn't anything they can or will do. they will deny you're being capped. usual excuse is exchange/network congestion......
 
marc2003 said:
nope. i very much doubt it it was done specifically to you because you went over your limit. like i said, it's completely random and even people who are extremely light users are being affected. and of course you won't get any help from india. and even if you complain and speak to someone here, there really isn't anything they can or will do. they will deny you're being capped. usual excuse is exchange/network congestion......
Click to expand...



really? oh jesus - ive just learned about BT's 'Fair usage policy' they basically cap you if you go over your download limit 2 months in a row - which i suspect i have. Im going to call 080070776044 tomorrow to find out if this is the case. If tehy deny it or refuse to remove it - ill leave. End of/.
 
well you might be lucky then. i take it your on option 1 or 2 then? i thought they just charged you extra for how many gigs you go over?
 
marc2003 said:
the throttling is completely random. some idiots on adslguide makes me laugh. there's actually a few bt fanboys who say we must be imagining our problems because their lines are ok and they're heavy downloaders........ well lucky them. but this problem is very real for lots of people regardless of their usage. i was on option3 - well option4 before it was changed. given that you would think you could at least use your old allowance of 40gb. well i didn't even use half of that in any given month and i was still throttled to hell and back. 12kb/s torrents? even a small torrent takes a day to download.... pathetic. 50-150kb/s http downloads. also crap. on paper you would think that would be fast enough for normal browsing. but it wasn't. i couldn't even stream any video and pages were taking noticeably longer to load.... :mad:

if you're out of contract then leave right now. no point in messing around thinking things are going to get better.
Click to expand...

You hit the nail on the head there, I was having the same problems, watching a film on you tube or cnet took an age to download. Now with BE and enjoying the great speed boost.

Rob
 
Before jumping to conclusions here, have you run the BT Speedtest?

It's perfectly possible that the IP profile's dropped, and it's got nothing to do with your ISP.
 
sorry, yes, ran the speedtest - no joy - the results are:

Test1 comprises of Best Effort Test: -provides background information.
IP profile for your line is - 500 kbps
DSL connection rate: 448 kbps(UP-STREAM) 6048 kbps(DOWN-STREAM)
Actual IP throughput achieved during the test was - 439 kbps

and yet i run speed test and i can only get 512.!!!
 
tolien said:
Before jumping to conclusions here, have you run the BT Speedtest?

It's perfectly possible that the IP profile's dropped, and it's got nothing to do with your ISP.
Click to expand...

possible yes. likely? :p

but yup, it should be checked first. i'll try and remember that for future reference before i start grumbling about how much bt suck. :)
 
It's nothing to do with your ISP then - the problem's your IP profile.

You need to stop it dropping so low (the weather might be the cause, so there might not be anything much to do), wait for to increase again (should increase within 3 days), or get your ISP to reset it (without demonstrating that it's stuck, that's unlikely).

marc2003 said:
possible yes. likely?
Click to expand...

The cause in this case? :p
 
fastwunz said:
see my results reply dude
Click to expand...

there you go. i was wrong and tolien is right.

edit: tolien, so there's no way the isp can set your profile like that then? because he's going over his limit on a capped product..... you're saying this is purely down to line/sync problems. :)
 
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Been thinking about going to BE because of this, seems like a smart move :)

Terrible torrent speeds at peak times and weekends... And not being able to watch youtube vids without waiting for them to load for the lose.
 
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marc2003 said:
edit: tolien, so there's no way the isp can set your profile like that then? because he's going over his limit on a capped product..... you're saying this is purely down to line/sync problems. :)
Click to expand...

It's possible, but extremely unlikely to be the ISP.
 
According to the indian call center ip profile does not limit your speed
just shows you what a mickey mouse operation bt support is !
i bet the billing department isn't mickey mouse though huh
my ip profile has never gone over 2000k even though most of the time
my router and the speed test says im at 5 meg download there's just nobody you can ring and tell/complain about your ip profile is the problem.
It's been a week since the flood and my line was fixed and it's taken that long to get back to 1500 k ip profile not holding my breath to see it go any higher
once the contract is up i'll be switching to virgin media cable bt just doesn't care
about their customers or service quality.
 
Mine is:-

Home Hub says : 5,768 kbs 448kbs

India says 5mb and no problems.

Bt speedtester says 4000kbs with it running at 3875kbs

Speedtest.net says between 300kbs and 3300kbs (depending on time of day)

I say FFS cant watch streaming news vids, cant surf, cant game, cant download patches or mappacks cos it crashes out.

India says, change your filters, check for emi, reset router.

Nope doesnt work, I still cannot download anything for more than a few minutes before the hub crashes out and i have to restart the whole lot to get re-connected to it. :mad:
 
It's bt again not providing a quality service or even caring
the mere fact they have an indian call center speaks volumes.
On bt speedtest what is your ip profile you need to see that.
 
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