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The BT threat

Dear Customer,

We thought you'd like to know that your broadband usage in April is now above 80GB.

In accordance with our Fair Usage Policy, and to protect the online experience of all our customers, if your monthly broadband usage goes over 100GB, we'll restrict your broadband speed at peak times (typically this is between 5pm and 12am, but these times may change depending on the demands on the network) to 1Mbps for 30 days.

Please note: your service won't be affected in any other way - we'll restrict only your speed, not the amount you can upload and download.

We'll email you again to let you know if your usage exceeds 100GB. For more information, please see our Fair Usage Policy

<http://bt.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/bt.c...p.php?p_faqid=10495&cat_lvl1=346&p_cv=1.346&p_cats=346> .





What does this mean for me?

You have received this email because your broadband usage this month means you are a very heavy user (which is typically less than 1 per cent of all customers). If your usage has unexpectedly increased it may be for several reasons. If you have downloaded a peer-to-peer (P2P) client to your PC then your usage levels can be affected by other P2P users uploading files from your PC, you may need to adjust the settings or remove the client. It is also important to check that your wireless connection is password protected. If you suspect that your password is no longer secure then this should be changed.

You can keep track of your usage by downloading a free, independent, usage monitor from the web and installing it on your PC. This will only report the usage driven by that machine but it will provide an indication of your usage levels.



Best wishes,

BT Total Broadband team

BT Option 3 with unlimited downloads at 8mg/s
 
before you define the word unlimited using a dictionary, l tell you to throw that dictionary out.. because the word unlimited in an ISPs dictionary means there is some hidden catch.

in this case a Fair Usage Policy.. my best suggestion is you only dow "heavy downloading" outside of the times they have stated.. this is how l got around speed restrictions with previous ISPs that had similar policies..

still to reiterate "there is no such thing as unlimited" it may say it is but its one of those things that ISPs get away with stating even tho there are limits..

take AOL for instance, when l was with them l got kicked off for downloading more than 60GB, they state unlimited but they felt anything over that mark was considered a business customer so l was told to find another ISP.. l was told by a rep when l approached them about a letter that unlimited didnt mean l could download as much as l wanted.. it just ment unlimited time online which took the biscuit since thats what ADSL is supposed to be

another ISP called EurISP, states itself as unlimited but their excuse for telling me to leave before my contract was up was "excessive port usage" (l only ever used three ports, one for P2P of anime, one for FTP, and one for SSH) and l kinda dont see how thats excessive, then again l did make allot of complaints to them (so it could have been just an excuse), then again wouldnt you if you had been experiencing the same issues as another ISP on their network (check the Fast4 posts if they are still around and youll see what l had to deal with)

still one thing l have found most ISPs seem more relaxed if your on LLU based hardware older technologies like ADSL/ADSL MAX seemed to cost more to provide where as ADSL+ (LLU) doesnt rely on BT hardware (tho lm sure someone else can provide a better explanation than this)
 
It's important to recognise that, to most ISPs, the word "unlimited" is all about access and does not reference any kind of commitment to service speed. That means they can promote unlimited and may even slow your service speed but so long as they do not disconnect you then they can, unfortunately, continue to use this misleading term.

Some ISPs do fall foul. One recent example being O2, which began disconnecting customers who used more than XX GigaByte's on their Home Access (BT) package. Now in this case it is patently wrong to advertise something as "unlimited" if you are going to disconnect them later. Reducing service speed is one thing because you still have access, but taking away access makes the term look criminally false. Worst of all, O2 specifically promoted it as "unlimited downloads" :( .

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/story/20...-limits-after-heavy-user-cut-off-threats.html

So the reduction in service speed is sadly quite normal under most Fair Usage Policies (FUPs). However there are some providers, like Sky Broadband Unlimited and vISPs using the unbundled cable and wireless platform, who do claim to offer truly unlimited services. It's unclear how long they will be able to do that though.
 
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Please note: your service won't be affected in any other way - we'll restrict only your speed, not the amount you can upload and download.

By restricting your speed aren't BT automatically restricting the amount you can upload and download?

If your normal line speed is 6mb then you can download around 45 megabytes per minute, if they restrict your speed to 1mb then the amount you can download per minute is restricted to around 7 megabytes.

I have always hated the way internet providers use the english language.
 
Yes indeed, perhaps we should take this as an example that not even BT understands how the internet works :) .
 
going by their openreach techs ld say that was a pretty good assumption since most of them dont know their arse from their elbows the moment you mention "l have a problem with my ADSL" out of all the ADSL engineers lve met who came to troubleshoot problems when l have had them from BT, all they ever knew how to do was mess up my cabling and rendering my connection useless.

last tech decided my extension wasnt installed correctly, so he changed it around and l couldnt use my net after, yet the problem l reported was intermittent connection, regardless of the happenings they lumbered me with a £180 fee for callout which was later removed because in essence they did nothing, l still am none the wiser to the problem because l never got my full speed back after that, however one thing l do know is that problem started the same day an exchange next to my exchange region went down, and when my problems stopped that problem had been fixed tho l never got my original speed back sadly.
 
I hit the BT fair usage limit of 100Gb when my son was home from University. I tried to get BT to remove it to enable me to manage my download - and I got what I understand is their standard negative response. At this stage I was seeing normal speeds of circa 6.5mb off peak throttled to circa 1mb peak. As I was annoyed with BT's attitude and I decided to allow the downloading to continue and live with the throttling at peak time. However after a very short period of time I discovered I was getting slow speeds at all times of the day and, mysteriously, my broadband seems to have suddenly developed a fault - the first time in 4 years since I moved house!. Despite many complaints to BT I'm now being told that they cannot resolve my broadband problem until the restriction is removed, which they are unwilling to do. This appears to be very convenient for BT and effectively has resulted in a speed restriction below 2mb on a 24 hour basis. Unfortunately I'm only 6 months into my latest contract but will definitely be leaving them as soon as the 12 months is up (I have been a BT broadband customer for circa 8 years, but they don't seem to be bothered about retaining my custom).
 
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my broadband seems to have suddenly developed a fault - the first time in 4 years since I moved house!. Despite many complaints to BT I'm now being told that they cannot resolve my broadband problem until the restriction is removed, which they are unwilling to do.

That's nonsense of course, being limited by their Fair Use Policy doesn't prevent them from fixing any alleged "fault".

BT's FUP clearly states that heavy downloaders will only be limited at "peak times", so if you believe that BT is intentionally limiting your speed 24/7 then you could take it up with the ISPA.
 
might also be worth taking it up with Ofcom as well, tho on occasion Ofcom can be pretty useless... really depends on what type of customer service rep you get l find.. some are just jumping to help you and others just sit there giving you the "lm uninterested so lm just sitting here pretending to listen" vibes, at least in my experiences calling the service.
 
BT broadband speed

Thanks for the advice. The fair usage limit came off yesterday and I still do not have anything like full speed so it will be interesting to see how BT proceed. This appears to have been very convenient for them and I'll be interested to see that, if and when the full speed is returned, what happens if I go over the 100 gigs again.

The BY customer service and technical help seem pretty useless - I don't know how they rank compared to other ISPs.
 
Number two.
BT <http://www.bt.com/>

Fair Usage Policy: your speed may be restricted at peak times

Dear Customer,

We thought you'd like to know that your broadband usage in June is now above 80GB.

In accordance with our Fair Usage Policy, and to protect the online experience of all our customers, if your monthly broadband usage goes over 100GB, we'll restrict your broadband speed at peak times (typically this is between 5pm and 12am, but these times may change depending on the demands on the network) to 1Mbps for 30 days.

Please note: your service won't be affected in any other way - we'll restrict only your speed, not the amount you can upload and download.

We'll email you again to let you know if your usage exceeds 100GB. For more information, please see our Fair Usage Policy <http://bt.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/bt.cfg/php/enduser/cci/bt_adp.php?p_faqid=10495&cat_lvl1=346&p_cv=1.346&p_cats=346> .





What does this mean for me?

You have received this email because your broadband usage this month means you are a very heavy user (which is typically less than 1 per cent of all customers). If your usage has unexpectedly increased it may be for several reasons. If you have downloaded a peer-to-peer (P2P) client to your PC then your usage levels can be affected by other P2P users uploading files from your PC, you may need to adjust the settings or remove the client. It is also important to check that your wireless connection is password protected. If you suspect that your password is no longer secure then this should be changed.

You can keep track of your usage by downloading a free, independent, usage monitor from the web and installing it on your PC. This will only report the usage driven by that machine but it will provide an indication of your usage levels.



Best wishes,

BT Total Broadband team

Please note that this is an automatically generated email for your information only. Unfortunately we cannot respond to 'replies' to this address.

Privacy policy <http://www.bt.com/privacypolicy> • Update your profile <https://www2.bt.com/btPortal/application?namespace=security&event=link.login&pageid=profile_centre&siteArea=con.pfc&type=overview&com.bea.event.type=linkclick&portletns=profilecentre>

Contact us <http://www.bt.com/contactus>

Why this email was sent
This email was sent by BT to your email address because its content concerns one of your BT Services.

British Telecommunications plc. Registered office: 81 Newgate Street London EC1A 7AJ Registered in England No. 1800000.
 
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Number three

Number three
Fair Usage Policy: your speed may be restricted
at peak times

Dear Customer,

We thought you'd like to know that your broadband usage in July is now above 80GB.

In accordance with our Fair Usage Policy, and to protect the online experience of all our customers, if your monthly broadband usage goes over 100GB, we'll restrict your broadband speed at peak times (typically this is between 5pm and 12am, but these times may change depending on the demands on the network) to 1Mbps for 30 days.

Please note: your service won't be affected in any other way - we'll restrict only your speed, not the amount you can upload and download.

We'll email you again to let you know if your usage exceeds 100GB. For more information, please see our Fair Usage Policy.





What does this mean for me?

You have received this email because your broadband usage this month means you are a very heavy user (which is typically less than 1 per cent of all customers). If your usage has unexpectedly increased it may be for several reasons. If you have downloaded a peer-to-peer (P2P) client to your PC then your usage levels can be affected by other P2P users uploading files from your PC, you may need to adjust the settings or remove the client. It is also important to check that your wireless connection is password protected. If you suspect that your password is no longer secure then this should be changed.

You can keep track of your usage by downloading a free, independent, usage monitor from the web and installing it on your PC. This will only report the usage driven by that machine but it will provide an indication of your usage levels.



Best wishes,

BT Total Broadband team

Please note that this is an automatically generated email for your information only. Unfortunately we cannot respond to 'replies' to this address.
Privacy policy • Update your profile • Contact us Why this email was sent
This email was sent by BT to your email address because its content concerns one of your BT Services.
 
fred, I think we get the point.

I dont know what it is you are doing with your connection, but assuming it is P2P, why dont you use the scheduler to stop downloading during the peak hours BT are so **** about??

100Gb is quite a lot, I have a peak allowance of 25Gb and only reach that if I have done some serious p2p downloading; even my off peak usage is rarely higher than BT's peak time limit.
 
ALL my downloading is done after midnight, and ends before 7am. Like me there are people with families in this forum who have a wife, kids, multiple laptops, gaming consoles, mobile hookups, and that all adds up to heavy usage. My P2P client is set up to limit itself to 40gb. I have Thinkbroadband's excellent TBBmeter running in the background. The other 2 thirds are picture and video uploads and downloads as part of photography and video editing work.

I put them up because not enough people know that exceeding BT's questionable fair use limit will drop their online speeds to that of a dialup connection. For a business person that could be lethal.
 
"For a business person that could be lethal. "

True, but these are domestic services, a company is supposed to use a more suitable (and expensive) business package.

Perhaps you should switch to a package like mine where you are charged per Gb for going over instead of being throttled??

I would also check to see what other family members are doing during peak hours and see if they can switch any heavy downloads to off peak times.
 
It doesn't have to be a business package, there are a few ISPs such as O2/Be, Sky or even Talk Talk who all have LLU packages that are for all intents and purposes unlimited. (as in really unlimited, not BT's version of unlimited).

To any BT customers who are finding their fair use policy to be a problem, my advice is to leave at the first opportunity.
 
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BT revamped their fair use policy a few months ago. I had an email from them just after i signed a new shiney 18 month contract. Having said that i will be jumping ship at the first opportunity.

When i climbed all over the BT website looking for the ideal package i chose BT's Option 3 because it was just that, the ideal package. At the time they even stated that it was "ideal for the heavy user" The fraudulant fair use policy has only just become an issue because it has only recently been upgraded.

If i was to use 101gb watching Youtube, surfing, or downloading BBC movies then the fair use is not an issue. If just 1 byte of that is from a P2P program then the fair use policy kicks in and BT get slap happy.
 
If they did that to me (changed the fup that quickly), I would have invoked the unfair changes option and cancelled.

TBH I Wont use BT after an incident a few years ago; my bill arrived an hour before I left for the airport on a 12 day holiday, so I left it to deal with when I returned.
When I returned 12 days later my line was cut off!!

I spent 6 months refusing to pay the bill or a reconnection charge until they explained in writing how sending a bill, a red bill and disconnecting someone in a 12 day period (including weekends) was appropriate behaviour.

They wouldn't, so I paid the bill, refused the re-connection and told them to sod off!!

Strangely, although my phone was cut off, my broad band kept working right up until the day I paid the bill!!
 
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