"Pro" option ...

... seems to have been deleted for (edit - adding as an option to /edit) current products.
http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/quality_broadb...

A good idea in my opinion, following the logic of the prioritisation blog.

Edited by RobertoS (Mon 28-Jan-13 18:53:32)

... which gives rise to the question of whether those currently paying for the Pro option on the Unlimited product will be actively encouraged to stop.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

... seems to have been deleted for current products.

Nope: http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/speed_guide/tr...

Nope. No encouragement so far.

Between that and a capped upload at 400k, one wonders if 'pro' is a first class as the mail.

I'm not sure what Pro has to do with the upload being capped or not?

I can't see us emailing those that have the new Unlimited + Pro telling them to remove it though.

Six weeks and counting. Bob knows about it, but I haven't heard from him on it for a while now.

The Pro add-on has *nothing* to do with the wholesale product you're on.

If your line has been capped it won't be Pro doing it as that does not have any interaction with the ordering systems.

I know, but one issues is just that. Two is sorely lacking in support imo.

In reply to a post by Oliver341:

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

... seems to have been deleted for current products.

Nope: http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/speed_guide/tr...

What I meant was it is no longer available to opt into. I've edited that into my post.

It has definitely gone from the page I linked to, even though it was there recently and the "Last update" line has not been changed. Chris's comments in this thread seem to confirm my opening post.

Edited by RobertoS (Mon 28-Jan-13 18:54:24)

I am on ADSL - unlimited version and it is still here https://portal.plus.net/AddOns.html

You may have missed my clarification edits in my two posts Jim . And note Chris's post re not forcing existing opt-ins to leave it.

Ah - I see what you mean, I appear to be able to add it as well.

Perhaps as we signed up before it was withdrawn it forms part of our product set. But new signups perhaps don't get it offered?

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

Perhaps as we signed up before it was withdrawn it forms part of our product set. But new signups perhaps don't get it offered?

It still appears to be offered here: http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/products/pro-A...

In reference to www.plus.net/support/broadband/products/pro-Add-On-faq.shtml:

3. How do I get Plusnet Pro?

Just add Plusnet Pro to your broadband at our Add-Ons page.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

But new signups perhaps don't get it offered?

Activated on Unlimited Fibre on 15th Jan. It's available on my "add-ons" page on the portal. 5 quid a month to increase the priority levels of VPN, External FTP, Download sites, P2P/Usenet, and Other traffic types.

Unless I have misunderstood the issue...?

It was present very recently on the page I linked to at the start Robert .

I think I probably had it right when I suggested those of us on any product that had it available when we signed up still have it available to add on. But anyone signing up now will not have it presented on the Add-ons page.

Again, I refer everyone to Chris's post, which certainly seems to mean it ain't there no more .

You may be right, Bob, although that's not how I interpreted Chris's posts.

I thought it was just a "documentation error" on the page you linked to. The service is still listed as a "current" product in the pricing guide, table 5, here:

http://www.plus.net/info2/legal/price_guide.html?sou...

I guess the definitive answer will come from a PlusNet rep, if they wish to comment...

For unlimited users the add-on will boost the total speed of all the traffic on the line from as fast as the line will go to as fast as the line will go. So if you think the Pro add-on will boost speeds you are wrong.

What it does do is alter the relative priority of the traffic on the line. It will only make any difference when the line is maxed out.

I'm quite disapponted that seeing as he posted in here after the doubt arose, that he hasn't yet clarified.

That's the trouble with these guys who have work to do as well as post on here .

at Chris.

I have no idea why that page has changed.... I'll check tomorrow.

In reply to a post by jelv:

For unlimited users the add-on will boost the total speed of all the traffic on the line from as fast as the line will go to as fast as the line will go. So if you think the Pro add-on will boost speeds you are wrong.

What it does do is alter the relative priority of the traffic on the line. It will only make any difference when the line is maxed out.

Yes exactly. And then only for downstream traffic, since the only thing that can affect priorities of upstream traffic types is my own router.

So, with the new traffic management strategy the Pro option doesn't seem like a useful product for most customers (even more so for Unlimited customers), unless you want to pay extra to have p2p traffic squeezing your streaming traffic for bandwidth (for example) when your line is running flat out.

I guess the only time it might be useful is under network congestion (as opposed to access link congestion) when some of your low priority traffic (eg p2p) can take priority over other people's low priority traffic... If I've understood the traffic prioritisation queue strategy correctly.

Thanks Kelly.

Are you sure it's changed? The last change we can see to it was done on 10/12/12 (and rolled 19th) and that's come from Andy who does all the content changes

We updated the page for the Unlimited roll out and haven't touched it since.

I asked about this service before signing up to Plusnet Unlimited Fibre and was told it's already included and that the link was there in error.

In reply to a post by KellyD:

Are you sure it's changed? The last change we can see to it was done on 10/12/12 (and rolled 19th) and that's come from Andy who does all the content changes

We updated the page for the Unlimited roll out and haven't touched it since.

So Pro is not on the rate limiting page, but perhaps it should be. Essentials is rate limited at certain times, and Pro removes those limits, which is probably why Pro used to be on that page, to highlight this fact.

In reply to a post by The_KELRaTH:

I asked about this service before signing up to Plusnet Unlimited Fibre and was told it's already included and that the link was there in error.

I don't think that's strictly accurate - if you look at the "Traffic Prioritisation" section on this page you will see that the product exists and does alter the priorities assigned to certain traffic types for Unlimited Fibre customers:

http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/speed_guide/tr...

It would probably be fairer to describe it as a legacy product which was useful with the previous traffic management strategy, but which is no longer particularly useful for most customers, especially those on Unlimited packages.

Edit: I stand corrected - as Oliver has said, it may be useful to customers on Essentials packages, but my point about Unlimited packages stands, I think.

Edited by deleted (Tue 29-Jan-13 12:02:07)

In reply to a post by KellyD:

Are you sure it's changed? The last change we can see to it was done on 10/12/12 (and rolled 19th) and that's come from Andy who does all the content changes

We updated the page for the Unlimited roll out and haven't touched it since.

I'm absolutely sure. I've used that page several times since 19/12/12. The Pro drop-down was definitely there until very recently.

IIRC both the Unlimited drop-downs also had the same table format as the others, with everything saying Line speed. Now they just have two lines. However, I could be mistaken about that last change - maybe they had been reduced to two lines and I'm remembering the Pro table.

So I agree nothing has changed re the facts presented about the unlimited packages. But the page has changed. Pro was there.

Edited by RobertoS (Tue 29-Jan-13 13:26:20)

In reply to a post by Bright:

http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/speed_guide/tr...

Uh! We have something very odd.

If you follow your link, scroll to the bottom and click the "Guide to broadband speeds" link. Then in the Getting Started section click "Broadband Experience".

Click the down-arrow on Unlimited Fibre. Scroll down that and read Section 2.

Surely from what we read elsewhere on the site, particularly the traffic management blog, those times shouldn't be there - it should be 24/7?
_{Edit - typo.}

Edited by RobertoS (Tue 29-Jan-13 14:29:24)

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

Surely from what we read elsewhere on the site, particularly the traffic management blog, those times shouldn't be there - it should be 24/7?

They probably thought that a page stating "peak hours" are midnight to midnight does not read too well. No doubt Plusnet will be talking to OFCOM about re-designing the KFI, since it doesn't fit in too well with Plusnet's products.

Indeed. I would have expected "Is traffic management used during peak hours?" to say "No". It's not used during peak hours, it's used 24/7 as Oliver says.

The two ticks in the table are not wrong, they are just a small part of the story. PlusNet's traffic management strategy looks good to me (at least on paper), but it's not easy to fit it usefully into OFCOM's simple table. Time will tell if the strategy works well in practice - it relies on maintaining a suitable build-ahead margin for capacity across the network. Not always compatible with tariffs that are highly competitive in the residential market.

Yes, I agree it is all dependent on good forecasting, and maintaining the commitment to provide.

They must have been very sure they could do this for at least a couple of years, else all hell would break loose and their reputation would end up worse than it has ever been. Which a while ago was pretty bad.

Fingers crossed!

Absolutely. It also means it's really important for us to be listening to what you guys are telling us re: performance to make sure we've got it right.