In UK, Broadband Limits Confuse Nine In Ten Users

Mark Jackson writes "ISPreview reports that 86% of UK broadband users don't understand the usage limits on their service, and nearly one million have reached or exceeded their ISPs limit in the last year. This is important because 56% of major providers are prepared to disconnect those who 'abuse' the service. However, it also shows how damaging bad marketing can be, with 6.2M people believing they have an 'unlimited' service with no restrictions. The UK Advertising Standards Authority is also blamed for making the problem worse by allowing providers to describe their services as unlimited even if there is a usage cap, as long as it is detailed in the small print. However, consumers are none the wiser with over 10 million broadband customers never reading their usage agreements and a further 1.8M not knowing whether they have read it or not. Unsurprisingly 7.5M do not even know their download limit, which is understandable when so few providers clarify it."

Comments

further evidence

[PunkOfLinux]

that limited unlimited plans are a bad idea.

Really, just throttle them based on how much theyve used in a given period. everyone wins. consumers keep their service, and providers can cut their bandwidth down a bit.

Re:further evidence

[dintech]

That way you don't lose your customer

Take PIPEX as an example. I've been subjected to 56K speeds for exceeding my bandwidth quota of 50Gb per month. I can tell you that if I wasn't on a one-year contract, they would have lost a customer immediately.

Once this go-slow was lifted, I noticed that they were actually throttling my connection even when I'm a long way under my quota. I was getting a perfectly flat 512Kbps instead of the advertised 8Mbps and the 2Mbps I was getting previously. When I called to complain about it, they told me it was contention because of the olympics. When I pointed out that contention would cause variable transfer speeds instead of a flat one, they tried to get me off the phone and told me to write to their head office. I totally hate that company. Avoid.

Bunch of Tossers

[Finallyjoined!!!]

The UK Advertising Standards Authority are a bunch of complete tossers.

They'll stop an Apple ad claiming the iPhone can reach the whole internet, but they let these ISPs advertise unlimited when it is anything but.

Double Standards anyone?

The only confusing thing

[Threni]

is why are companies allowed to describe something as unlimited when it's limited. If that was changed, there'd be no problem. The ISPs always say `most users....` then I lose attention. If most user don't use 50 gigs, then limit it to 50 gigs.

Leave it as it is

[L4t3r4lu5]

10% of the users using 90% of the bandwidth still leaves 10% for Grandpa to check his email and your sister to update her MySpaz.

Why punish those who actually USE what they paid for? I've had the same contract since BlueYonder "real" unlimited connections, and my usage hasn't changed. All that's changed is as soon as ive watched a couple of iPlayer programs, my downstream drops from 250k to 100k. My dad, mum, and brother don't notice, so there's 75% who don't understand and aren't affected. Only we know, and only we use it.

Re:Leave it as it is

[Shaman]

Because you never pay for it, the price has a built-in over-subscription requirement. Dedicated bandwidth costs a lot more. Go price a DS-3 and see.

What you're saying is a little like saying you want to use the whole road for yourself at the maximum rate possible. After all, your taxes pay for your access to it.

Re:Leave it as it is

[lysergic.acid]

that's bullshit. the average price of U.S. per Mbps is about 10 times higher than countries like Sweden, Korea, and Japan, and it's still 2-3 times that of most other developed nations. just because the telecom/ISP monopolies charge extortionate rates for decent quality service doesn't mean that's what it costs to provide.

consumers expect what they paid for--what was advertise by the ISPs. if they'd been honest about the broadband service in the first place, this conflict would not have occurred. trying to shift blame onto consumers and use traffic throttling & package shaping to manipulate demand is counter to good business sense. while we're trying to scapegoat "power users," countries like Japan are upping their infrastructure to meet public demand. that's how technology usually works--you increase supply (speeds, capacity, etc.) to meet public demand. you don't artificially decrease demand to meet the supply.

unlike you, most intelligent internet users don't subscribe to this pay more for less mentality. and if you actually did some research into how other broadband networks/services are run, you'd see how much we're being completely screwed over. Japan's already rolling out 100 Mbps connections to all homes, and many are being offered 1 Gbps for £28($43). meanwhile ISP greed and incompetence is leaving our countries in the dust.

but, hey, let's spend more packet shaping technology analyzing user traffic to increase unnecessary overhead. that's a much better use of resources than actually increasing network speed/capacity and providing better value to customers.

Go for a truly unlimited provider

[shin0r]

Thanks Slashdot, two chances to plug http://superawesomebroadband.com/ in two days.

"Unlimited connections on static IPs. No download or upload limits. No port blocking, no packet shaping, no transparent web caches, no 'fair usage' policy, no logging, no Phorm, no ad-serving, no small print. Rolling 1 month contract. No lock in period. Direct Engineer Support 24 hours a day, every day. Good, not cheap. £60 /month"

PS - Link to complaints form

[Finallyjoined!!!]

Whenever you see an ad claiming "unlimited" from an ISP you know limits in the small print, i.e. BT, Talk talk, Virgin, Tiscali etc. Send in a complaint.

http://www.asa.org.uk/asa/how_to_complain/complaints_form/