BT thottled me, 2 days before monthly cycle ends. No Internet for 30 days now

Sebby

So I have a 24Mit line (Unlimited traffic with fair usage) since a month now.
When I signed up for it I asked the sales guy what the fair usage policy means. He said that in case some people download "insanely" much, they would just throttle the speed a little bit for a few days.
Asking how much "insanely" is, he just told me that the limit is so high I wouldnt need to worry about it... so I signed up for it.

Yesterday suddenly my Internet stopped working, well I thought it stopped but then I noticed if I wait like 5 minutes, it would actually open Google.ie
So my Internet is just really slow (10KBit to be exact).
I called BT yesterday and they said I have been throttle for over usage.
I got really angry on the phone and I told them that the salesman said I would never reach it, but they pretty much didnt care nor would they unthrottle me. And on top of that, they said I will be throttle for 30 Days now!!! Although my monthly cycle would end tomorrow, I will still be throttled!!!! WHAT THE F*CK???

So, I have been throttled for using 110GB!
I do not download anything illegal. I downloaded World of Warcraft legally from Blizzard Website, inlcuding all the Patches and the Addons.
That alone was almost 20GB.

I also have a Steam Account where I own a few games, and since I have a 24Mbit line, I thought I'd download them all.

Left 4 Dead (5GB)
Empires (15GB)
Silverfall (20GB)
Fuels of War (15GB)
Unreal Tournament 3 (8GB)
BioShock (8GB)

After downloading WoW, and the Steam games, watching lots of YouTube videos, using Skype with Webcame on a daily basis, I have reached 110GB in 28 Days.

I am soooooooo mad at BT!!!
First they're throttling their customers after using 110GB on a 24Mbit line is just not realistic on any level! And on top of that, they just cut of my Internet for 30 DAYS!!! They should throttle my Internet for the 2 remaining days of the cycle, but not 30 Days!!!!
I cant even check my E-Mails with the current speed!

Its like giving away free Ferraris saying just don't drive too fast, and when you go above 50MPH, they come and throttle your engine so you'll only be able to drive 0.5MPH!


I am soooooooo angry and mad at BT!!! I cant even cancel my Contract since I just singed up!


Is it just me or am I over reacting? I think this is wrong of BT!!!

bobbbb

They should have told you what the cap was. Do they not have a mechanism where you can see how much of your cap you have used? If they dont then its not really fair.

Sebby

There is no official cap since its the Unlimited package.
The salesman just said that I wouldnt need to worry about it.
But whats more frustrating is, that they will throttle me for no reason for 30 days, although my first monthy cycle ends tomorrow? Whats the point behind that? I dont understand it at all....doesnt make since nor is it in anyway customer friendly!

I went over their monthly "Unlimited" Traffic limit, which is obviously at around 100GB, just 2 days before the billing period would have ended.
Now I have to pay for the whole April without being able to use the Internet! Is that even legal?

Hagar

That's a crock, unlimited should really mean unlimited or else they shouldn't be allowed use the term in their advertisments. UTV did the same thing a few years ago. IMHO it's blatant false advertising and they should be taken to task for it.

Somonedude

"they said I will be throttle for 30 Days now!!! Although my monthly cycle would end tomorrow, I will still be throttled!!!! WHAT THE F*CK???"

- See if they only throttled people for FUP breach on a scheduled 1st til 30th basis they would see everyone that wanted downloading huge amounts at the end of every month and standard residential users would pay the price.


"I also have a Steam Account where I own a few games, and since I have a 24Mbit line, I thought I'd download them all."

- Just because you can do something doesnt mean you should.


"Its like giving away free Ferraris saying just don't drive too fast"

- Its more like giving them away and people thinking they are allowed break the speed limit simply becasue they can more easily now.


I'm sorry but they are well in their rights, I have never used bt but should they have not sent a warning letter to advise first and ask you to monitor your downloads/uploads?

Shulgin

There is a warning on the usage monitor when you are in danger of exceeding the cap on the lower packages. Is there anything similar for the *unlimited package?

Throttling to 10kbit is a complete joke though.

godskitchen

Somonedude wrote: »

"they said I will be throttle for 30 Days now!!! Although my monthly cycle would end tomorrow, I will still be throttled!!!! WHAT THE F*CK???"

- See if they only throttled people for FUP breach on a scheduled 1st til 30th basis they would see everyone that wanted downloading huge amounts at the end of every month and standard residential users would pay the price.


"I also have a Steam Account where I own a few games, and since I have a 24Mbit line, I thought I'd download them all."

- Just because you can do something doesnt mean you should.


"Its like giving away free Ferraris saying just don't drive too fast"

- Its more like giving them away and people thinking they are allowed break the speed limit simply becasue they can more easily now.


I'm sorry but they are well in their rights, I have never used bt but should they have not sent a warning letter to advise first and ask you to monitor your downloads/uploads?

- Does someone work for BT? Either that or you are the first ever BT Fanboy.

hightower1

godskitchen wrote: »

- Does someone work for BT? Either that or you are the first ever BT Fanboy.

lol oh lord no! Definitly not a fan of them, I work in telecoms and have to deal with their unique style a little so I wouldnt call myself a fan boy.

Just giving advice on what the general ISP's contracts say.... if you do note I do say they should have advised him i.e if they have not he should contest.

joebre

Reading this post and I am confused as to who is replying to whom ?
Is hightower1 referring to a post by someonedude as if they were the same person ?
Both joined up today !

hightower1

joebre wrote: »

Reading this post and I am confused as to who is replying to whom ?
Is hightower1 referring to a post by someonedude as if they were the same person ?
Both joined up today !

lol ya sorry about that, registered to the wrong address and couldnt see an option (or was too impatient to look properly) so created to my main email address. Sorry. Ether way looking forward to helping out here if i can.:)

joebre

No problem.

It's seemed strange when I was reading the post !

joebre

Blindpew

It's a pity you didn't visit these boards before you signed up with BT. There have been volumes of posts written about their unfair usage policy. The only solution is to be happy with 3gb a day or else leave them.
I should think that if you have only signed up you should be able to tell them to stuff it, as it's not what you were led to believe you were buying. Customers must have some kind of rights after being misled.

hightower1

Blindpew wrote: »

It's a pity you didn't visit these boards before you signed up with BT. There have been volumes of posts written about their unfair usage policy. The only solution is to be happy with 3gb a day or else leave them.
I should think that if you have only signed up you should be able to tell them to stuff it, as it's not what you were led to believe you were buying. Customers must have some kind of rights after being misled.

Very true, these "unlimited" caps are a sales line. They arent illegal but certainly arent good business ethics. If there are no clear cut figures for people to stick to then it leads to confusion that really could have been avoided.
One would think there would be some kind of government regulation on product descriptions /labeling / information to be followed?
There is a good list here of usefull info http://www.broadband.gov.ie/List+all++Services/ but some of it is out of date and even so not everyone would be aware of this.

Fighting Irish

Sebby wrote: »

well I thought it stopped but then I noticed if I wait like 5 minutes, it would actually open Google.ie

you're lying now :pac:

BlackWizard

I've been throttled for the last 3 days now too

I made a thread to figure out how this throttling works but it was locked and I was told to "use the search function"

I still can't find much.

What I'd like to know if the rolling days works the opposite way so that after 30 consecutive days I go over 100gigs I'm throttled so what if after 3 days my last 30 days total download is at about 80gigs. Should I not be unthrottled?

Blindpew

BlackWizard wrote: »

I've been throttled for the last 3 days now too

I made a thread to figure out how this throttling works but it was locked and I was told to "use the search function"

I still can't find much.

What I'd like to know if the rolling days works the opposite way so that after 30 consecutive days I go over 100gigs I'm throttled so what if after 3 days my last 30 days total download is at about 80gigs. Should I not be unthrottled?

That is certainly the way it used to work, unless, having gotten away with this diabolical practice for over a year, BT may have decided to throttle offenders permanently. Nothing would surprise me with them.
Normally if you downloaded 100gb in three days you would be throttled for the next 27days. If you only download 3gbs everyday they'll leave you alone. That would give you about half an hour each day on the 24mb package if you were using Rapidshare and getting the proper speed. That's what BT consider Fair Usage of their unlimited package.

vibe666

the real shame is, if anyone ever managed to do anything about the fup ISP's would only make it worse for everyone by lowering all the caps to take into account that they couldn't use fups any more.

Hagar

Or it could force them into providing the service they advertise...

ynotdu

Under pressure from anti piracy organisers,the E.U is country by country signing up to a 3 strikes and your out policy,France has already enshrigned it in law & reportedly Eircom have agreed to it in principle,what they perceive to be unfair usage even on home starter plus(30g download allowance per month,unlimited upload,even though tech sites again&again tell me my i.s.p is slowing my upload speed)

The 3 strikes=a warning email,a warning postal letter, then a disconnection!

In my opinion B.T do not believe you are using your connection for legal activity,or simply want to pay less and cut back on their bandwith bill.
I would tell them to fcuk off and sue me if I was You.
Tell them you are changing providers and looking into the fine print of your contract with a view to getting legal advice& publicising their behaviour via sites such as this as well as the national airwaves,of course you must be sure all is in order on your end first,for instance anybody cracked your wireless if you use it?.best of luck with the greedy B,s

Hagar

A vote in the French Parliment last week prevented that being passed into law in France. There is speculation that a newly drafted version will come before Parliment again later this year.

bealtine

Hagar wrote: »

A vote in the French Parliment last week prevented that being passed into law in France. There is speculation that a newly drafted version will come before Parliment again later this year.

The 3 strikes and bandwidth management are also being sneaked through into a bill before the EU Parliament called the Telecomm Package.

See www.blackouteurope.eu

jor el

BlackWizard wrote: »

I made a thread to figure out how this throttling works but it was locked and I was told to "use the search function"

I still can't find much.

You asked how long you would be throttled for, and it's been mentioned many times that BT use a 30 day rolling cap for the throttling, but a calendar month for the usage meter (which is not very helpful). If your past 30 day usage drops below 100G, you should be unthrottled, but remember that this will not be the value recorded in the online usage meter. Also, I don't know if anyone knows exactly how BT implement their system, whether it's automatic or manual, meaning it could take them a few days longer to release you.

The long and short of it is, BT's FUP is crap. The even shorter long and short of it is, avoid BT.

memeyouyou

To the OP, you'r screwed, get over it and move on. Fill in your time for the next 30 days by playing the 'games' you downloaded

BlackWizard

memeyouyou wrote: »

To the OP, you'r screwed, get over it and move on. Fill in your time for the next 30 days by playing the 'games' you downloaded

Very constructive. NOT.

BlackWizard

I just rang BT and complained. Well it turns out I was never throttled and a miracle just happened. My broadband is back to normal BT claim to know nothing about me being throttled :eek:

Took me 5min to get through to technical support. And the chap was pretty nice to deal with.

memeyouyou

What a super timewasting thread that was.....:rolleyes:

LEIN

Please tell me this time waster has been banned!

memeyouyou wrote: »

What a super timewasting thread that was.....:rolleyes:

Move to UPC is my advice. I done 30GB in one sitting last Friday and at least 2-3GB a day with not a word from them.

noodler

I have downloaded alot of games from the PSN lately (including Siren Blood Curse which was 8GB itself), my download speeds are now crawling a little (also BT).

I did a bit of research and I am on 3mb so I have a 30GB a month limit and I think I may have gone over it this month (though it is touch and go), I will probably never go over it again but is there a way of actually checking on my computer exactly how much I have downloaded this month?

Thanks in advance.

ynotdu

noodler wrote: »

I have downloaded alot of games from the PSN lately (including Siren Blood Curse which was 8GB itself), my download speeds are now crawling a little (also BT).

I did a bit of research and I am on 3mb so I have a 30GB a month limit and I think I may have gone over it this month (though it is touch and go), I will probably never go over it again but is there a way of actually checking on my computer exactly how much I have downloaded this month?

Thanks in advance.

go to the Eircom.net site,navigate around until You find check Broadband stats.enter your area code followed by - then your telephone number,then enter your account number,it is accurate to the date you see on the graph and each particulor 24 hours stats end at 6am,so far Eircom have not charged for excess usage to home customers anyway but they reserve the right to.

vibe666

noodler wrote: »

...my download speeds are now crawling a little (also BT).

ynotdu wrote: »

go to the Eircom.net site,navigate around until You find check Broadband stats.

how is it helpful for you to tell a BT customer (in a BT thread) to check their stats on the eircom website?

The info you require is in the 4th post of the Broadband FAQ sticky post at the top of the broadband forum (for future reference). it's currently listed as 'IOL' (BT broadbands previous name), but to keep things simple, here it is: http://broadband.iol.ie/usage

just log in with your broadband username and password (the one you entered into the router at set up, or possibly on your documentation they sent you at set up).

Cabaal

Lads the whole BT FUP/cap is very well known and can easily be found out by searching google, if you download over BT's FUP then they are well within their rights to throttle you.

You can't agree to T&C's and when things don't go your way or because you didn't understand the T&C's you cry and moan when they throttle you especially when this is done in-line with their T&C's.

If you don't understand or agree with T&C's then you clearly should not being agreeing with them, you should instead look else where for services that are more suitable for your needs.