The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

How many ISPs advertise 'Unlimited' Broadband? Most do, and then hide the actual limits in a FUP (Fair Usage Policy) which often don't even specify what is fair...

If you are fed up with this, please sign the e-petition at the 10 Downing Street website by going to http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Unlimited-ADSL/

Thanks

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

It's not really a swindle - you just have to do your homework first.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

This is a typical extract from a well know ISPs FUP.

"This fair usage policy automatically identifies the very small number of extremely heavy users and manages their bandwidth only during peak hours (6pm to 11pm Monday to Sunday), to protect the service for all our other customers."

they don't say what is defined as heavy users, BUT on their main sales page they quote UNLIMITED time online and downloads..they can't have it both ways. Its either 'Unlimited' or its managed.

Here another one from a Major provider. Again on the main sales page they quote Unlimited Usage

Unlimited usage

"unlimited usage so you can surf, download and watch content online to your heart’s content. Fair usage policy applies" but there is no link to this FUP. You have to hunt through the website, to find the FUP only to read...

xxx will monitor network performance and may restrict the amount of bandwidth available to very heavy users during peak time to ensure that the majority of the customer base has a good customer experience.

Broadband is a contended service, there is no such think as 'unlimited', ISPs need to be honest and upfront with their customers and quote the usage limit that they are using as their guidelines and stop using the term 'unlimited' in relation to usage. By all means say unlimited time on-line, but don't tell us that our usage is unlimited...it never is. Customers should not have to try and decode an obscure FUP.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

Yes - and?

I'm with Tiscali and peek hours are 6pm -11pm. I'm on "unlimited" downloads. I get a 40GB allowance for peek hours - this is calculated during peek hour downloads only...the rest of the time it's unlimited.

Whats so difficult to understand about that?

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

This brings up memories of the dreaded "cap threads"...

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

Signed... I hate having to do that kind of homework for friends and family... Especially when they probably never will be capped.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

Highly unlikely I'm afraid. There's no such thing as an unlimited service, during off peak, you can bet you will be heavily traffic shaped. Something Tiscali are particularly good at. ;)

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

i would say 90% of people that are using the unlimited and have the fair usage policy kick in, are acutally downloading illegally anyway. All that will happen if you do get them to stop saying unlimited, is that they will monitor what you are downloading and just use that to restrict you.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

Would you care to clarify that statement? :(

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

what needs clarifying?
anybody who downloads 100's of gbs a week/month will be downloading copyright material fact!
the goverment and isp's are running away from this issue if the music and video content were to be monitored/stopped the broadband industry would die....why else would anybody want 10mb/20mb/50mb iptv?....bulls**T

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

Im not saying everyone that downloads that amount is downloading copyright material, i push a lot but i use the connection for work, and installing windows, and linux over the internet can push a lot of BW. However i bet if you had a vote where there was no tracking, and you asked people how much there transfer was vs how much of it was legal you would find the more that was transfered, the more that was illegal.

Some dont even know there doing it, theres some sites that charge you to download things so you think its legal, but its not.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

Who's talking about 100GB's a month? I only need to push a bit over 40GB during peek hours and they could be on my case.

I'm a IT engineer and thus download quite a lot in ISO's, Service Packs and other legit software - and some of this will be within peek hours.

BTW - I will sign the e-petition!

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

all they do is limit your connection in peak hours, its not like they cut you off or shout at you, you just might find your connection drops from 10Mb to 6Mb (thats what happens to a friend of mine), its not like its anything major.

And as an IT engineer i'm sure that you know how over selling works, i would love to find a DC that will give you a 10Mb connection 24/7 for £35 a month, you might be able to get it for £50, but that would be pushing it.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

Tiscali limit my connection in normal bloddy hours but thats another thread!

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

Thinkbroadband have a new News item leading on the 'unlimited' debate, with a link to the e-petition.

See: http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/3...-material.html

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

This is exactly the point I was making. Too many ISP's hide behind packages advertised as "unlimited", and then throttle users, to limit how much bandwidth they use. IMO it's wrong, personally I would much prefer a capped service, at least you know where you stand. If an ISP is going to offer an unlimited package, it should be exactly that, with no traffic shaping to con the user.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

Really..... my friend is on Tiscali and he hasnt had that, just in peak hours.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

wander what bt will do to me as im uploading nearly 13fv ontop of what id usally use.

(recently upgraded my mozy account to a paid one and am backing up my pc to it)

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

He is bang on right, check in a dictionary what the word unlimited means.

If there is any form of limit of what you can download within the connection speed its not unlimited. The isps are more or less relying on their ability to 'missell'.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

Most ISPs it seems to be something on the lines of "we wont set a fixed limit on how much you can download" but if we may throttle p2p .etc etc

Yes its annoying but i can understand why its done.

Unless your mega rich and can afford to pay for a 1:1 contention ratio (and even then it would only be uncontended upto a point) your sharing the pipe with other users.

I'd much prefer getting slow P2p speeds during peak time than slow browsing/ bad ping on games becuase someone is hogging all the bandwidth for bittorent.etc

I also prefer this meathord personally as i then know im not going to get a whopping bill becuase i downloaded to much this month or whatever.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

dragon then the defenition they should use is unmetered not unlimited.

unmetered would imply no metering of use so no unexpected bill but would allow limitations to take place and still be accurate. Even flat rate would work.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

that would make perfect sence :)

Which is probably why they don't use it.

someone up their in marketing probably decided unlimited (even if it is wrong) sounds more attractive than unmetered.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

indeed.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

kind of reminds me of this...

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

Governments response released:
http://www.pm.gov.uk/output/Page12235.asp

Basically says, they can get away with whatever they want, as long as it's at least half-reasonable, and that the ASA should be contacted... blah blah.

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

Yep - seems to be the way with these .gov petitions...

The gov will always take the side of UK PLC...

Good old rip off Britain / consumer strikes again! :rolleyes:

Re: The Great 'Unlimited' Swindle
 

yeah they dont want to interfere seems now both major parties have adopted the attitude of the market will run itself without intervention and effectively giving companies the right to lie to their customers.