AAISP Double TeraByte Home Broadband Package Allowance
UK ISP Andrews & Arnold (AAISP) has today announced that customers of their TeraByte home broadband packages (Home::1), which includes 1000GB (GigaBytes) of monthly usage, will see their usage allowance double to 2000GB (2 TeraBytes) from August 2018, at no extra cost.
Prices for the Home::1 2TB tariff, when also including copper line rental, typically start from £50 inc. VAT per month for ADSL and £60 for superfast VDSL2 (FTTC), while their FTTP tier costs £55 as this doesn’t require a copper line. You can also subtract -£10 from the ADSL and VDSL product prices if you don’t plan to take AAISP’s own line rental service (e.g. when getting your phone or copper line from another provider).
According to Ofcom the average superfast broadband customer in the United Kingdom gobbles 231GB (GigaBytes) per month, thus 2000GB should be more than enough for the majority of consumers.
A&A Statement
When we first launched our 1TB tariff, the idea was that it was meant to be ‘pretty much unlimited for most people’. Most of our customers don’t go over 1TB (1 terabyte) and the quota isn’t something they worry about.
However, usage patterns change, people watch more streaming video and download more. In an effort to keep to the original goal of the 1TB tariff, we’re happy to announce that from August 1st the 1TB Home::1 tariff will become 2TB/month. No change in cost, and the ‘quota bonus’ will still be applied.
Our order pages and web pages will be updated w/b 30th July. Customers ordering the 1TB tariff during July will be changed to 2TB on August 1st.
In similar fashion to their Home::1 2TB tariff increase, AAISP has also announced that from August 1st the existing 2TB SoHo::1 (business) tariff will become 5TB/month. No change in cost, this applies to existing and new customers.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook and Linkedin.
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Excellent news. There are very, very few users indeed that would have to concern themselves with a 2TB limit, it’s many standard deviations from the median user.
Despite my extensive use of Steam / Origin and our being a very connected house with my being a home worker this would leave me very relaxed about taking up an A&A package.
Well done A&A.
I just don’t understand the point in a limit, no one else does this.
It’s more common among business providers where quality is important and makes it easier for ISPs to balance their capacity costs by not over-promising. But these days you are correct, unlimited has become more the norm.
@Jono. They are not the only ones that have allowances. After all, it is a much fairer business model as the multitude of light users do not then have to subsidise the serial downloaders.
I know what you mean but… but I’m not really sure it is fairer… they charge a lot more than everyone else.
Part of it is that they simply don’t want people on the service who use enormous amounts of data for no real purpose beyond that they can. Digital hermits aren’t something any ISP is a fan of.
No home user has a legitimate need for the full downstream capacity a 40Mb FTTC service can produce month after month. The occasional very heavy month when recovering backups or redownloading content but using several TB each and every month suggests someone downloading because they can and discarding most of what arrives as it’s simply not feasible to consume it all.
Exactly, Jono. Demonizing users for actually using the service to its fullest is so yesterday. What it really says is that the ISP hasn’t invested in enough resources and is using the “heavy downloaders” as an excuse.
I’m glad to say that 2TB is effectively unlimited for me, since I can only get ADSL at 20Mb/s which can’t pull in more than about 1TB downloading 24/7. I normally use 200-300MB per month. Therefore, when my current contract finishes, I’ll be happy to consider AAISP again.
Jono,
Personally I think the “once model for all” works better – AAISP give everyone who wants 1TB the same allowance for the same price.
It keeps things clean and simple – and IMO should be used more widely.
“Exactly, Jono. Demonizing users for actually using the service to its fullest is so yesterday. What it really says is that the ISP hasn’t invested in enough resources and is using the “heavy downloaders” as an excuse.”
Or maybe they have the potential to invest in the resources but believe as i would if running an ISP…. Just do not attract heavy downloaders in the first which can quickly make a product suffer, and attract complaints from your long running userbase. Leave them and their torrent collecting habbits (or whatever that mob are into now) to go elsewhere.
“since I can only get ADSL at 20Mb/s”
“I normally use 200-300MB per month”
Congrats you are worried about limits, feel people should be able to use thing to their “potential” yet at full speed you use your service for less than 2.5 minutes per month. Okay :$
@un4h731x0rp3r0m
I see you’re an old skool demonizer/hater that’s stuck in 90s. Well done!
I hope you sign up to a really expensive ISP service with a 100MB cap and that the two of you live happily every after. Hooray!
“I see you’re an old skool demonizer/hater…”
If you are going to say an ISP is “demonising” users and I am a “demoniser” can you at least adjust your Yankee Doodle spell-checker to British? I would like to be an English demonic being rather than a Stars and Stripes one.
“I hope you sign up to a really expensive ISP service with a 100MB cap and that the two of you live happily every after. Hooray!”
Cheers ill let you know if they are worth the expense and if they have a heavy users package for your massive 300 MB which AAISP obviously would demonise you about.
Kind regards 😀
Well to put it simply.
AA go for a quality over quantity service – charge a modest fee and keep the same fee no matter what.I’ve never know a price rise in AA – I’ve seen a price decrease and allowance increase so far.
This is pleasing to see – especially the SoHo::1 package jumping from 2TB to 5TB. AAISP are well respected among enthusiasts for their technical skills and quality of service, but many enthusiasts are also large bandwidth users. So it’s good to see that finally there is a package for all but the very heaviest users.
However, it’s worth nothing that the draw of unlimited packages isn’t just for large data volumes, but it’s also peace of mind. With an unlimited offering, the user isn’t needing to manage their usage or be predicting what their consumption will be for the next 12 months. All they need to know is no matter what they do, they’ll pay a fixed price.
Agree. I had a quick look and we our house use between 250-500gb a month. So would be well under, I just wouldn’t want to feel like I have to keep my eye on everyone’s usage. For me those days are long gone.
I have a combined speed of 770Mbps and even I don’t do more than 1TB a month now.
I do a hell of a lot of uploading which AAISP say is not something they care about – so if they can allow me to upload a few hundred GB a month I will join them.
It’s all legal stuff and mainly business
Simon – I can confirm that uploads are not included in the download quota. Though download traffic that is generated as part of the upload is… I found that uploading at 20mbit/s typically means I am downloading 500kbit/s, which does come off the quota.
Thanks Carl,
I am looking at the SOHO because it’s business based. I wouldn’t use 5TB and I would love for a few TB to roll over every month if that’s possible. Incase it’s needed further down the line.
I upload often 20-100GB files and I didn’t want to take the piss in either case.
KingJ – I don’t think anyone on 2TB or 5TB would need to bother watching either- I’ve done just over 3TB this month and I haven’t even thought about the allowance – even if it is unlimited.
Edit I had no idea I had done 3TB – 4K videos of internal housing layouts sure take some data up :/
I wish they up their base package. I hardly use more than 200GB but some month I might hit the 250gig limit nice to have the 300gb on them 🙂
Who knows man.. If you look here https://www.aaisp.net.uk/broadband-home1.html it shows the FTTP packages on low allowances going up massively.
I will NEVER join AAISP because of silly usage allowance limit. Should be UNLIMITED by now come on, it’s 21st century.
You would just whinge at the price – so they probably don’t want you either.
Welcome to the Real world – stuff has a cost. Do you get unlimited electricity too?
What happened to your loads of money in the bank and getting FTTPoD Max?
I get unlimited Electricity – I have to pay for it in monthly instalments though 😛
A step in the right direction i guess! Small steps.
Do AAISP still do the roll over thing with their bandwidth? Say i used 1.5TB in one month in the next month would i get 2.5TB?
Yes, half of the unused quota from the previous month rolls over.
I would be getting about 2.5TB a month roll over on SOHO I am glad to report 🙂
2TB is way more than most people would use.
It would be nice if they increased the quota on say their “middle” package as well, say 750GB at that £55 price point.
Though, I’ve just signed up for the 2TB package, and frankly can’t wait. Wish I’d signed up years ago.