Posts Tagged ‘bandwidth’

Orange really wind me up…

December 28th, 2009

So as you probably know, I recently built my own computer. It’s all going brilliantly. Except from one thing…

Orange are a little bit annoying sometimes. In fact, they aren’t what you’d call an A* ISP. Their router is a little shabby (it can’t decide whether it prefers English or French, and it often forgets that it has ever been turned on), and their customer service isn’t brilliant either.

However, the one thing that annoys me most of all is the poor management of bandwidth usage. It’s a pain. I know that Orange seem to provide 40GB of monthly usage but they give you no means whatsoever of monitoring how much bandwidth you have consumed in one month.

Then, they say that if you use more than 40GB a month they’ll send you a warning and then cut your speed to 512kbps!! What the hell? They won’t let you monitor your bandwidth but they’ll send you a letter if you go in the slightest over 40GB.

And then if you fail to lower your usage after that, they’ll cut your connection!

Frankly, I’d rather pay a little extra per month than have my speed throttled if I go over my usage. Doesn’t that seem like the more sensible thing to do from a company point of view? They make a little more money rather than loosing a customer.

Honestly I think Orange are making big mistakes and ripping us off. Bethere do unlimited 8MB broadband for £13.50 per month on a shorter contract (12 months, compared to Orange’s 18 months) and there’s no set limit on how much you can use per month!

Come on Orange, this is rubbish!

Petition: Stop ISPs falsely advertising “unlimited” broadband bandwidth!

November 12th, 2009

Here on GEEK!, I’m fed up with ISPs that claim they supply unlimited broadband when they actually don’t, after you’ve spent ages reading the Fair Use Policy.

I think this is totally unfair and must be stopped. If ISPs don’t want us to use as much bandwidth as we like, then they should say so, before they tangle us in a 12 or 18 month contract. It’s stupid!

I’m not going to mention ISPs that do this – but there are plenty. It’s totally unfair that ISPs expect us to read a fair usage policy and understand what bandwidth is. I do, but most people don’t have time to dig through pages of FUPs and frankly aren’t interested.

It must stop here. GEEK! has set up a petition and if you have a problem with ISPs falsely promoting “unlimited” usage broadband please feel free to sign it below. You’re information won’t be given to any third party other than Ofcom if GEEK! decides to hand the petition results over. All that is required is your name and email address.

If GEEK! gets enough people on the list, he’ll hand it over to Ofcom and see what they say.

Thanks for your interest in the petition.

The GEEK! Broadband Petition: Stop ISPs falsely advertising “unlimited” broadband bandwidth!

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ISPs should just tell us the bandwidth limit, and not claim “unlimited”

September 19th, 2009

Following up from my investigation into which ISPs actually provide unlimited broadband, I am beginning to wonder why some ISPs advertise “unlimited” broadband when it clearly isn’t.

It confuses me – why can’t ISPs just advertise the amount of bandwidth that you are actually allowed to use rather than advertising a service that isn’t correct? Isn’t that some sort of fraud? I mean if I went out and bought five pints of beer and only got three, I’d be a little annoyed (honestly, I’m not like that – I don’t drink!, it’s just a scenario). It’s a similar sort of service.

Unlimited means something that has no limit. We all know that. So why are ISPs telling us a lie?

It just doesn’t make business sense to me. If you are an ISP, why do you want to tell customers they can download as much as they like when they really can’t? It just creates hassle - if users download more than you want them you have to send them a letter complaining that they are downloading too much, then another letter if they don’t have a reaction to your first letter, then threatening warnings about legal action, then court cases – it goes on and costs money!

Wouldn’t it just be simpler if ISPs just made it absolutely clear how much you can download per month without having to go through endless “fair use policies” that often don’t claim the usage allowances anyway? Aghh! This one is very frustrating.