Traffic Shaping Affecting All Tiers

Originally Posted by welwynrose

but most residential ISP's have some sort of limits place - whether it be traffic shaping or caps - Sky's 8mb service has a 40gb a month cap thats less than 1.5gb a day

VM customers are paying vm, not sky or bt or whoever.
And atleast sky are stating a limit which helps the customer decide if it is to their needs.

---------- Post added at 17:07 ---------- Previous post was at 17:05 ----------

Originally Posted by meangreenie

That 5% of users in a day is a lie.. each and every day for a week now i have downloaded nothing till 4.00pm when i start a download for testing ..lol that's how much of a heavy user i am... and after 20 minutes I get cut to 1Mbit... as i am right now, this minute.

My advice to everyone is to ring 150 and choose option 4.. the cancelation department.. and tell them you are leaving because of this, just watch how fast they talk you out of it and half your bill.

Whats the number if you are not with vm for telephone?

[brundles]

Originally Posted by RXP

This is the statistic offered by the corporation introducing the shaping. I'm not saying it's incorrect, but they have no reason to report accurately.

People are getting frustrated by this purely because 21 mins of usage is considered excessive. And if only 5% of users download >3gb at peak time there is little consumer demand for 20mbit. The only people demanding it are those 5% who can make use of it.

No demand for 20mbit? By artificially lowering the service level at peak times, they are attempting to create a demand for the expensive 20Meg product. (Which you'll only see run at 5MB).

[meangreenie]

arcamalpha2004.. i don't know the number off hand for non virgin phone.. maybe someone else can help.

again.. i advise everyone to ring up and threaten cancelation. I have no problem with traffic management in theory, but the way this has been implemented is draconian... the 5% in a day of highest users is an outright lie.. the truth is 20 minutes of downloading or streaming means your connection gets cut in half (edit corection as pointed out..'or quatered') for EVERYONE

[RXP]

I just called to cancel and the woman had no idea about the shaping. i told her it's for 21 mins use between 4pm and 12pm and she thought I was obviously incorrect because that isn't excesive.

Lolz, they could inform their staff to conform to their propaganda eh

[peanut]

Originally Posted by meangreenie

the truth is 20 minutes of downloading or streaming means your connection gets cut in half for EVERYONE

Or a quarter.

[meangreenie]

How can she deny it, it's on their web page

[RXP]

Call centre monkey, prolly been barred access to the internet to increase the amount of calls she takes per hour.

[McMav]

Have to laugh they class 350 MB high usage on lowest teir yet someone on the highest teir gets to dl almost 10 times as much do they pay 10 times more no double so either the lwest teir should get a 1.5 GB limit of the top teir gets a 700 MB limit.

Not well thoguht out atall.

[kar]

A few points from my perspective here

- I don't mind if they 'manage' traffic - as a heavy user I do understand my usage may be out of the ordinary (but recently found out not so much!), but the manner in which they've gone about it seems terribly hamfisted.

- Reducing the upload speed so much is actually a bigger deal than reducing the download speeds. For example 5mb with a 256 upload is going to make anyone trying to download AND use a transmitting application such as online games / voip (and of course p2p) is going to suffer from terrible latency issues.

- Capping the 4MB product after 750 meg is an utter joke. Online gaming for several hours will easily consume that much bandwidth, have a home network with multiple devices and it's nearly impossible to avoid the capping. And that's without even being a newsgroup hound...

- The cap seems (from my reading of it) to be based on your usage that day. That is someone who is a habitual downloader (okay me) can chill out for one night and be okay, but be on a binge every other waking hour. Someone who never utilises the beauty of newsgroups decides to download a couple playstation 3 demos from their online store and boom capped. How is that fair?!

Basically Virgin have every right - and indeed imo the responsibility to ensure their network is not congested by abnormal users going boonta. What they have done instead is taken a lazy, cheap approach and essentially given EVERYONE not just the magic 5% they bandy about a usage limit between 4 and 11.

It's not fair, it's not targeting the right users and it's not enough.

I would rather have a finite cap that I can manage and have the speed when I want it, than some ludicrous cripple cap that is impossible even with reasonable usage to avoid.

I don't mind being capped, but not like this.

Adios Virgin in September...

[RXP]

Just got off the phone with retentions. I'm still on my minimum 12 month contract so they wouldn't cancel it. He said it's not a big enough change of service and that they've had terms and conditions in the contract which make it all fine and dandy.

Er.... the FUP said it's unlimited before. This is a new term in the contract and therefore I should be able to terminate it. But Virgin aren't palying fair.

He also spoke blatent lies. Said Sky's max service has a 60gb a month cap. Said the Virgin limit was 6gb and insisted bandwidth was cut in half not a quarter. Also said Virgin have fastest broadband in the UK and I wont get faster anywhere else. This kind of mis-selling is dishonest and unlawful if it induces you to stay in the contract (misrepresentation). Next time I call to cancel, I'll be recording the call and suing for damages.

[mcmanic]

well this makes me even more angry with VM

just announced

Xbox 360 Video Marketplace Due In Europe In 2007
In an exclusive interview, Robin Burrowes, the UK’s Xbox Live Product Manager, declares that he’s on a mission to bring the Xbox Live video marketplace to Europe this year. He states: “We hope to have some content that hits in 2007”. For the full inteview and all the latest details, press the link.

News Source: http://www.gamerzines.com/pdf/360zine_6.pdf


well thanks VM, whats the point of BB and paying xbox live and not being able to use it

[nofrills]

Just caught up with this after seeing my speeds cut by exactly half for the 2nd time this week. Not a happy bunny at all, still need to read up on any limits if there is that info but I haven't used the connection enough to warrant this. If I am deemed to it is crazy and unreasonable and perhaps time to cancel if I can get ADSL2 locally, which is a shame because cable broadband has been great til now, but I don't want to pay for a 10mbit connection and be physically capped at 5mbit. Not what I thought I had paid for..

[welwynrose]

Originally Posted by meangreenie

yes but their 16Mbit service at £10.0o per month is unlimited and yet you failed to mention that... Mr. Virgin representative

1) I am not a Virgin representitve ot a Mr for that matter

2) A lot of people can not get the full 16mb because of the distance from the exchange

3) Unlimited until you become and "excessive" user in their eyes according to the fair use policy

4) You don't like what VM are doing then change service providers or change your downloading habits

[meangreenie]

Originally Posted by welwynrose

1) I am not a Virgin representitve ot a Mr for that matter

2) A lot of people can not get the full 16mb because of the distance from the exchange

3) Unlimited until you become and "excessive" user in their eyes according to the fair use policy

4) You don't like what VM are doing then change service providers or change your downloading habits

1) yeh right

2) I bet they still get more than 1Mbit for £10.00 a month

3) I bet they still get more than 1Mbit for £10.00 a month

4) working on it (wip), the whole lot will have to go.. sky have a nice 5 step plan to get rid of Virgin without any disruption to my service

[RXP]

Originally Posted by welwynrose

4) You don't like what VM are doing then change service providers or change your downloading habits

Can't, they won't let me terminate my contract because I'm still within the 12 month minimum. I'd be happy to jump over to Sky, which has a cap of about 200gb a month last I checked.