Plus Net Traffic Management - Arrrrgh!!

[Pinkeyes]

Well theres the Sustainable Usage Policy AND the Traffic Management to sort out.
I just got this email from Plus Net
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This email is to notify you that you have successfully passed your billing
date therefore peak-time usage management has been removed from your
service.
To avoid further restrictions to your service please schedule large
downloads for off-peak times.

Thank you for your cooperation.
Kind Regards,
PlusNet Customer Support
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Removed from the Traffic Management Service !!
They didn't tell me I was on it!!

Apparently - the Sustainable Usage Allows 100 gig download in a month, and 30 gig Peak Times. So I make sure I use Netlimiter to limit my downloads between 4pm and Midnight so I dont go over this. I also check my usage on their website to make sure I dont ever go over these limits every few days.

They also have this other service, Traffic management, which runs between 8am and midnight, which if you breach, they put you on.
They don't warn you - or tell you if you are near the limit - they just put you on it.
There is no way of knowing how near to this limit you are - no charts - nothing.
How wrong is this ??

Ahh, that great "unlimited" service I signed up for - the 10 or so people I recommended to them, who are now customers (how bad do I feel about that now!). And now the hassle of finding a new ISP, informing my contacts of my new email address - going to every website account and changing addresses... oh the joy.

I don't even know which way to jump...

Thanks - I feel a little better for getting that off my chest.

Pinkeyes

 

[Pinkeyes]

i dont understand why you guys are all fleeing like a bunch of scared animals? are you seriously downloading that much that you need to leave to another ISP which will at very least cost more just to let you have unlimited download bandwidth?
maybe it doesnt matter to me so i guess i dont see why everyone's wanting out or complaining about it.
apart from the lower caps on various packages there isnt anything bad about them atleast nothing i've came across

I don't, and have never been near the download limits set by Plusnet. The problem is that they have got this new "traffic management" to go alongside the "sustainable usage" - and have punished me for breaching the traffic management without (at the time) having any system in place for me to check the traffic management usage. Or inform me they have placed me on the traffic management. As if its not confusing enough...

"The Sustainable Usage Policy has a peak time of 4PM to Midnight and applies to all traffic. The traffic management policy has a peak time of 8.00 AM to Midnight and applies to FTP, Usenet and P2P"

 

[Pinkeyes]

Doubtful as the service is still much faster than 50:1. Even their highly restricted protocols (e.g. P2P, USENET) are still guaranteed 64Kbit/s IIRC.

Thats a lottle over modem speed. Wasn't getting anywhere near that on Usenet...

 

[Pinkeyes]

How does one find out if one is on "Traffic Management"..??

If your with plusnet they will inform you via your email account and you will notice your speeds are going 25% of what they shhould be.

Thats my main gripe here. They didn't warn me I was getting near, inform me they had placed me on traffic management, or provide any usage at the time to allow me to check or confirm this. They now have put another usage chart in place. I want to know why I was "punished" in this way.

 

[Pinkeyes]

Well when I asked them about them putting a system in place, and punishing me without warning or notification - and how can they punish people without having a system in place to monitor our traffic management. They replied...

We have been working hard to provide such a system for customers. This system is now available on our View My Broadband Usage tool.
That said, it has always been the customers responsability to monitor the usage of their own account and systems.

 

[Pinkeyes]

Except the whole point of BB+ that they pushed in their sales blurb was that the end uesr didn't have to manage the service.

Totally agree.

The thing is, I tried to manage the service, as far as checking my download usage (you never know if the bloke next door found your wireless network and has been downloading DVDs for a week)

It's got beyond a joke now.
I have to watch certain traffic types between 8am and midnight.
I have to watch downloads between 4pm and midnight.
I have to watch total downloads every month.

I am allowed to download 100 gig, I rarely go over 10 gig.. so I am hardly one of those customers they are trying to get rid of, yet they have done this which is just pushing me out of the door.

Same thing with Stelios, hardly a heavy user, yet he's off as well.

Just what type of cutomer do Plus net want ???

 

[Pinkeyes]

So you can't download from 8am till midnight!!, jesus thats rough , i can download from 11pm till 6pm the following day, the peak hrs are only from 6pm till 11pm at weekdays, and 12pm till 4pm at weekends and bank holidays, and i can download how much i like, and whatever i like as said, and there was me thinking Tiscali were bad.

No. Its perfectly simple. (ahem)

As a broadband Premier user you can...
Download anything between midnight and 8am
Download 20 gig of usenet traffic per month between 8am and midnight
Download 100 gig per month
Download 30 gig per month between 4pm and midnight.

That clear now ?

Heh

 

[Pinkeyes]

Now im fairly good with computers and computer literate but to the every day punter, that is just going to say WTF in there face.

Totally agree. I work in IT, and find their T&Cs unnecessarily complicated.

Would your every day punter even know that the E Donkey they have switched on permanently is P2P traffic ?

 

[Pinkeyes]

I'm on the PN plus £14.99 service and it's been fine up until a couple of weeks ago, now pro evo 5 is carp. Is that this traffic shaping whotsit kicking in then ?

Quite possibly. Check your PlusNet usage.
The thing is, even if you go over over your Sustainable Usage (100 gig a month OR 30 Gig Peak times) your supposed to get enough bandwidth for gaming.
If your hit with Traffic management it just cripples any FTP, NNTP or P2P traffic and again, games are unaffected - but everyone I know who have been hit with it says game Ping times go all over the place....and all online games are unplayable.
They ticked the "I won't do it again box" and once they return to normal traffic - games worked fine again.

 

[Pinkeyes]

I don't download large files, just use it for gaming guess it's probably something else with mine.

Well go to Plus Nets web site, log into the Members Centre, and select "connection settings" from the left hand side menu. Your usage chart is in there.

You could also run a speed test from the ADSL Guide website here

 

[Pinkeyes]

No. Its perfectly simple. (ahem)

As a broadband Premier user you can...
Download anything between midnight and 8am
Download 20 gig of usenet traffic per month between 8am and midnight
Download 100 gig per month
Download 30 gig per month between 4pm and midnight.

That clear now ?

Heh

Ahh got yer.

In fact. I would go as far as to say remembering all that is just as easy as it was when I signed up to Plus Net.

"download whatever you like, whenever you like"

Time to find a good ISP again.

 

[Pinkeyes]

for those saying there getting a e-mail about you then being applyed on management it could be that you've done 3 months last year at 100GB peak+off peak and only now they're starting to working through peoples accounts? as i cant see how they'd apply a level to say Phantom_Masters measly 7GB throughout one month.

Very probably, iirc they did that with the Sustainable usage, told people it was going to happen, didn't implement for 3 months, and then nailed people who went over it during those 3 months.
They are such a customer based ISP. LOL.