Strange call from virgin.

[djmagnifique]

Just had a phone call from 'Margaret' from what sounded like one of the overseas call centres about the up coming speed increase and she mentioned that my 20mb would be upgraded to 60mb and sounded like she was going to offer something maybe, it was at this point I mentioned that i'm no longer on 20mb and am on 10mb. This she found confusing and started talking about the upgrade to 60mb again. Again I mentioned i'm on 10mb at which point she said thankyou for calling goodbye.

The number I was called from is 08004089340. Are virgin currently calling customers about the speed increase? Also i'm not due the upgrade until october at the earliest.

[jb66]

They are doing early upgrades

[djmagnifique]

I know about the early upgrades, What I don't understand is how she wasn't aware that i'm on 10mb and have been since january and kept going on about my speed increase to 60mb.

[General Maximus]

I dont know how it all works out but but they'll obviously have different systems for sales and technical and I imagine the one they'll be using for marketing might not be the most up to date or robust. They have made a boo boo.

That being said, there is nothing to stop you from ringing up retentions now, tell them about the mistake and see if they want to offer you an upgrade to 60mbit now for the same price?

[djmagnifique]

I don't think retentions will be much help as when I downgraded in january it was through retentions and did a new 12 month contract (which i haven't recieved yet). I'm currently getting a £10 discount until january 2014.

[WDLaserjetGLOVER]

I received a similar call today, offering me a free super hub and installation with an increase to 60Mb from 10Mb, for an extra £4 pm.
Is this worth it?

[jb66]

Yes

[Graham M]

Yes

Nice straight answer, for you it depends if you can afford the 4 pounds a month to justify the extra speed, as 10meg is generally only offered as a cost saver these days.

[General Maximus]

it is worth it to anyone, you are talking 66p per extra 10mbits. I wish I could do that and pay an extra £6.60 a month for 200mbit

[kwikbreaks]

it is worth it to anyone, you are talking 66p per extra 10mbits. I wish I could do that and pay an extra £6.60 a month for 200mbitThat assumes you'd get it. Unless my area has improved a lot I doubt I'd get 60Mbps as couldn't reliably get anywhere near the 50Mbps I was paying for most of the time.

[Chrysalis]

kwikbreaks you still left your connection on 10mbit?

you can get 30mbit for 10mbit price now from retentions. so cheap way to see if you cna get higher speeds now.

[kwikbreaks]

Yes it's still on 10Mbps - I did consider going to 30Mbps when the TBB monitor started looking better but retentions insisted I'd have to take a Superhub and pay for the privilege so I declined. I could probably have tried again to see if I got a rep with more knowledge but decided to just wait for Infinity instead. Any retentions deal would involve a new contract and I won't do that. I was just asking about a normal upgrade. I only ever call retentions in the hope of getting a better rep.

The cab I'll be on is in place now - not sure if it's cabled up but I have seen work being done on some others nearby. My exchange is listed as June. The neighbouring one is listed as March and there are loads of cabs in place in that area - I could order it on my daughters postcode so hers at least is taking orders. Looks like they are maybe on or even ahead of schedule.

There's a pic here (http://www.idontbelieveit.me.uk/bt-infinity-coming-adios-virgin-media/) of my cab being installed. All the footpath is back in place now and the barriers are gone.

[qasdfdsaq]

Is that your blog? Very well written I must say - though I should also point out average speeds an FTTC customer gets is 36mbps (out of 40), not the 20-30 you're proposing. And it'll be going up, a lot, and for most people before VM's go up.

[General Maximus]

yup. I tried finding out when Infinity was coming to my area earlier and saw that BT are planning to do 100mbit very soon. It would be so sweeeeeeeet if it was something like 100/30

[qasdfdsaq]

They're not planning 100/30 anytime soon on FTTC. 80/20 is coming next month (10th April).

100/30 is already available now, in FTTP areas, going up to 300/something.

[kwikbreaks]

...I should also point out average speeds an FTTC customer gets is 36mbps (out of 40), not the 20-30 you're proposing..I've updated it although the minimum guaranteed speed (before they flog the same tech under a different branding) is only 15Mbps. I'm about 300m from my local streetcab so I'd expect to get good speeds.

[qasdfdsaq]

True (for now) though, that minimum guaranteed speed is doubling to 30mbps, and the fault threshold is being removed - so from April there is no need to have a specifically low speed to despatch a tech. Also, VM have no guaranteed minimum speed at all.

Oh and at 300m you should get full speed (even on 80mb).

[kwikbreaks]

That's a little disingenuous - sfaik BT only guarantee 15Mbps minimum sync - I don't think they offer any guarantee on throughput although all the stuff I've seen suggests that Infinity is like the early days of ADSL and how cable is supposed to be - you should actually achieve something close to the theoretical maximum most of the time.

[qasdfdsaq]

The 15mbps sync is a bit different, it's a level below which they'll refuse to install (well they'll install if you push them hard enough), but very few people have lines long enough for that to kick in, virtually none in urban and suburban areas. Since the 80mb upgrade is done by (more than) doubling downstream line speed, anyone who gets ~25mbps now should be bumped up to at least 30, which currently is already >95% of Infinity customers anyway.

There is indeed a guarantee on throughput at peak times - though Openreach only guarnatee capacity from the exchange to the cab - from the exchange to the internet it's up to your ISP. Some ISPs guarantee that throughput too, IIRC it's not identical to the "prioritisation rate" but close - 12mbps for consumer and 16mbps for business, again to double when line rate doubles.

The reason FTTC gets so close to the headline speed is because of the heavy overprovisioning (or understating) of download speeds BT use. IIRC, last I calculated the 80mbps FTTC product actually runs on a bandplan with a theoretical max download of ~157mbps, capped down to a "realistic" figure most people could actually achieve.

[General Maximus]

They're not planning 100/30 anytime soon on FTTC. 80/20 is coming next month (10th April).

100/30 is already available now, in FTTP areas, going up to 300/something.

I need to give them a ring and find out what is going on because it says my exchange is enabled for infinity but when i put my postcode into the checker it says I cant get it. If I am paying for 100mbit fttp wont they have to run the fibre to the house anyway (meaning that I can/will get it if I pay for it)?

[qasdfdsaq]

FTTP on demand isn't happening till next year.

[General Maximus]

oh, when i looked at the packages available it said you could get 100/15 now

[qasdfdsaq]

Like I said, only in FTTP areas. There is no FTTC in FTTP areas. The two are mutually exclusive - for now.

[General Maximus]

With fttc do you still have the problem with speed and distance from the exchange. I am baffled why my area is enabled but my address cant get it. I have got a BT phone line and back in the day on 56k my line must have been squeeky clean because my speed was pretty much perfect all the time (for what 5.5k/sec is worth :) )

[Chrysalis]

That's a little disingenuous - sfaik BT only guarantee 15Mbps minimum sync - I don't think they offer any guarantee on throughput although all the stuff I've seen suggests that Infinity is like the early days of ADSL and how cable is supposed to be - you should actually achieve something close to the theoretical maximum most of the time.

on throughput they have a QoS system that ensures those speeds, is not a garuantuee although its still a lot better than just plain best effort.

[qasdfdsaq]

You are affected by distance from the cabinet, not the exchange. As I mentioned the average speed at the moment is 36mbps.

Have you checked the December 2012 postcode file for your posctode?

---------- Post added at 23:03 ---------- Previous post was at 23:03 ----------

on throughput they have a QoS system that ensures those speeds, is not a garuantuee although its still a lot better than just plain best effort.
There are actual, SLA'd guaranteed speeds available, but not as standard on all ISPs.