weird internet/ISP problem

[builder22]

a few weeks ago the internet stopped working at the house, no DSL or internet light was showing on the router and all the line stats data rate, noise margin etc were all showing 0
phoned BT and they said that there was no services on my line, and on checkin it turns out the payments hadn't been taken for a long time, but the internet had worked as normal all this time
today I've been messing about with my router and noticed all the line stats are back and the WAN IP, Subnet Mask, Default Gateway etc are all showing values now, there was nothing showing in those boxes when the broadband stopped working a few weeks ago
however there is still no access to the internet

why would the line stats and internet settings all be showing 0 a few weeks ago, I assumed that meant it had been cut off ??

 

[bremen1874]

You could try the BT test credentials to see if there is a connection there. I assume it still works, details here http://www.kitz.co.uk/adsl/bttest.htm.

 

[builder22]

cheers man, but it's started working now, pretty slow but all working fine apart from the download speed
I need to get some understanding of this though...if all the line stats were showing 0 before does that mean that it was cut off or might there just have been a problem at the exchange or somewhere, and it's now been rectified ? The clock on the router wouldn't even set to the right time, apparently it's supposed to get the time from an NTP server?

I sent an email to the CEO (his office anyway) yesterday explaining the problem and it's working today. Might just be coincidence but I have no idea what's going on!