New rates link

The link on this page is broken. Gives a 404 error.

http://www.aaisp.net.uk/newws-2010-04.html

Looks like a double "w".

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

The link on this page is broken. Gives a 404 error.

http://www.aaisp.net.uk/newws-2010-04.html

Looks like a double "w".

hmmmm yes its 'spot the daily spelling error' again

http://aaisp.blogspot.com/2010/02/info-new-usage-rat...

fixed, thanks

hmmmm yes its 'spot the daily spelling error' again

Its nice to know this is about the only thing to comment on.

Not looking good, speeds are bad during the evenings. Sucks being stuck on 20CN and now half the allowance.

What's with the changes to the stats?

20CN evening (6-12 M-F)

Some change coming after 12? What about the 2-6AM slot, hopefully that's staying?

I'm all for scheduled downloading, 50GB/unit is not that great.

I would also like to know if the 2am-6am unlimited downloading is to remain...

If this has been removed also, then AAISP seems to sadly be turning from a very good niche ISP for us 20CN users, to a basic one offering poor peak usage and average off-peak.

To say I am disappointed by this news is an understatement...

Edited by Eggplant0001 (Wed 10-Feb-10 15:12:05)

In reply to a post by Eggplant0001:

To say I am disappointed by this news is an understatement...

I don't like the way its going for 20CN with AAISP, not to meantion the evening speeds of late. I've migrated away for now, my exchange is due 21CN in Q4 (won't hold my breath). So I may come back, as I liked AAISP so much. Damn shame they made these unit changes.

Daily edits to the usage charts, no idea where they're going with it. And if I understand correctly carry over capped at 2 units.

20CN night (12-9)
20CN daytime (9-6 M-F)
20CN evening (6-12 M-F)

Edited by fornowagain (Wed 10-Feb-10 20:27:27)

This seems a shame, I've just joined and to get 2gig/100gig will be a £3.00 increase . It might not make any difference as I don't yet have a history of usage to go by.

Requested mac yesterday. Not planning to use it till nearer the end of the month.
Kind of saw this coming tbh.
Soon as i saw the new tarriffs i figured they were just going to result in getting hit big time during off peak. I mean if u save a gig during the day thats an extra hundred gig you can download off peak. People are going to take advantage of that, as they obviously have been.

Wasn't expecting the cuts to be quite so drastic though to be honest.
With the increased allowances introduced recently at idnet, it looks even worse value.
That's where i'm probably going to go i think.

I have read the page robertos linked to and the off peak is quoted as evening, so it looks to me that 2am to 6am would stay as unmetered.

As for the usage drops on the evening well that is what I consider aaisp been responsible, they recognise a problem and they taking action to resolve it to keep their previous high standards, other isps would either just let congestion build up or implement throttling.

Edited by Chrysalis (Wed 10-Feb-10 23:14:38)

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

I have read the page robertos linked to and the off peak is quoted as evening, so it looks to me that 2am to 6am would stay as unmetered.

Technically 2am-6am ceased being unmetered on 1 January. It is 1TB per unit. Click the How it works link on this page, just above the Additional Options section. The paragraph in italics on the target page.

So far as I know that isn't changing on 1 April.

I agree with you. I have no beef with aaisp, quite the contrary.
Fact is though to get the same allowance now that i had before the new tarrifs i would have to pay more.

And for me at least idnets top 20cn package is more attractive now.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

So far as I know that isn't changing on 1 April.

So they say, although judging by the new rates on the usage charts they're obviously planning on changing something.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

I have read the page robertos linked to and the off peak is quoted as evening, so it looks to me that 2am to 6am would stay as unmetered.

Technically 2am-6am ceased being unmetered on 1 January. It is 1TB per unit. Click the How it works link on this page, just above the Additional Options section. The paragraph in italics on the target page.

So far as I know that isn't changing on 1 April.

in that case I meant it staying as it is 1tb per unit.

What the say on their webpage and what they do can differ though - they might have forgetten to remove the small text when updating the tariff information - so I am hopeful we can get a response on here from someone at AAISP. It would be nice to know before the next billing cycle.

This is the only unsatisfactory aspect of the units-based system, the loss of clarity about the night rate. It was also included in the initial version of the estimator, but was removed for simplicity within a couple of days .

Without it in the estimator, that is indeed simpler to use. But far less clear wrt how the night-period can be used. See this post.

Earlier in that thread we have this query about the night period, and what I regard as an unsatisfactory short conversation following.

The implication is certainly that it is no longer a feature of the tariffs, just a temporary goody like for example all the offers of a lower rate for the first 6 months from other ISPs. As it isn't mentioned in the April 1 rates announcement, the uncertainty is damaging. Prospective and existing customers cannot at the moment know what they are signing up for, and that is always a major deterrent.

Edited by RobertoS (Thu 11-Feb-10 09:33:39)

Not being a customer I can't see the usage charts. Is there some recent change wrt night-time usage?

please could you tell me how many Be* enabled exchanges there are ? Not the combined o2/Be* figure

it seems to me that something is going badly wrong with the 20CN package and the alteration in peak/off peak and in light of the following

http://aaisp.blogspot.com/2010/02/info-calling-all-g...

I begin to wonder just what is going on. The current alerations for April along with possibly other changes are certainly not a good marketing ploy, upsetting customers is not a good idea.

20CN which costs the most from BT appears to be the problem but many exchanges do not have upgrade dates to 21CN showing particularly the small Market 1 exchanges. It becomes a 'postcode lottery' IMO

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

Not being a customer I can't see the usage charts. Is there some recent change wrt night-time usage?

My chart has changed copied/pasted for you.

This month Bytes Rate Units
Off peak (all line types) 813,165,221 100GB 0.01
20CN night (12-9) 182,234,592 100GB 0.00
20CN daytime (9-6 M-F) 1,674,559,660 1GB 1.67
20CN evening (6-12 M-F) 76,835,201 100GB 0.00
Units so far this month

In reply to a post by mistynow:

please could you tell me how many Be* enabled exchanges there are ? Not the combined o2/Be* figure

it seems to me that something is going badly wrong with the 20CN package and the alteration in peak/off peak and in light of the following

http://aaisp.blogspot.com/2010/02/info-calling-all-g...

I begin to wonder just what is going on. The current alerations for April along with possibly other changes are certainly not a good marketing ploy, upsetting customers is not a good idea.

20CN which costs the most from BT appears to be the problem but many exchanges do not have upgrade dates to 21CN showing particularly the small Market 1 exchanges. It becomes a 'postcode lottery' IMO

(I'm assuming you are asking me, as you replied to me). O2 LLU and Be LLU enabled figures are the same, so I don't quite understand your opening question.

Is your statement about 20CN nothing to do with that question? As Be have no 20CN or even 21CN connections. O2 Access, which is BT Wholesale based may have both or may just be 20CN - there is no public information on that so far as know.

In reply to a post by mistynow:

My chart has changed copied/pasted for you.

This month Bytes Rate Units
Off peak (all line types) 813,165,221 100GB 0.01
20CN night (12-9) 182,234,592 100GB 0.00
20CN daytime (9-6 M-F) 1,674,559,660 1GB 1.67
20CN evening (6-12 M-F) 76,835,201 100GB 0.00
Units so far this month

LOL - that's clear as mud! But thanks .

I can understand the 20CN daytime lines but not much else, and it doesn't seem to tie in with the existing times apart from the daytime ones.

Sorry for my muddled post yes I know that Be* have their own kit in exchanges and wondered how many exchanges that actually is ?

http://beusergroup.co.uk/technotes/index.php/Exchanges

Edited by RobertoS (Thu 11-Feb-10 10:21:55)

I still think it will be fine for night time usage, when I was a customer aaisp used to meter the unlimited usage periods anyway and never did charge for the usage and that was a couple of years back.

From what I can see in both the status page update and the link robertos posted the reason night time is not mentioned is simply because there is no change to it.

It could certainly turn out to be a "goody" RobertoS - though I seriously hope not. Reading your reply, and sifting through the links you posted, I came across this...

Quoted from RevK:

In practice, as always, we try to give plenty of notice of changes, and we discuss the changes with customers in advance. There is no compelling reason to remove the "night time is cheaper" logic from the tariffs as night time is low usage (as with all ISPs). We may change the way that is done some time in the future, that is all, but only with lots of notice.

If this is true, then why weren't 20CN customers included in these discussions? I was certainly not contacted at any point to discuss the plans. Admittedly, I myself am I new customer, attracted by the high bandwidth and unique tariff structure. I only use 100gig if I am really hammering it - I only pay for 2 Units, but I don't appreciate that I have had my bandwitdh cut in half in the short space that I have been with AAISP. Fair enough, the limits used to be lower, etc etc, but when I joined these new tariffs were the way forward for AAISP - any they "believed everyone would be better off".

I can understand that they've made a mistake - they have gambled that giving more bandwidth won't hit them where it hurts, but it has - but seriously...reducing our 20CN by half, yet increasing 21CN usage allowance?! Thats just insulting!

Edited by Eggplant0001 (Thu 11-Feb-10 11:10:06)

Makes sense if you include the explanation at the bottom of the usage page

Off peak (all line types) - Rate 100GB
Night time special - Rate 1TB **** 2am - 6am
20CN night (12-9) - Rate 100GB
20CN daytime (9-6 M-F) - Rate 1GB
20CN evening (6-12 M-F) - Rate 100GB

Peak/Daytime usage is 9am to 6pm, Monday to Friday. Off peak is all other times.

*Night time usage: We currently have a special bonus aimed at people doing backups and file transfers over night. Instead of the normal 100GB/unit off peak tariff, between 2am and 6am usage is metered at 1.00TB/unit.

The reason they've split it up into day/evening/night is the evening usage rate will be dropping to 50GB.

I still think the rates and time allocations are good, and very competitive compared to other ISPs

Edited by Achy2 (Thu 11-Feb-10 11:26:15)

I only half agree with you. Off-peak is now competitive & comparible with other ISP's (rather than better) and peak time is prety dire, even though it isnt that long.

You're missing the point that only 20CN users are suffering though - everyone else seems to be reaping the benefts.

Hi

2am - 6am is not changing and remains metered at 1000GB/unit.

http://aaisp.net.uk/broadband-units.html

Thanks for your reply and for clarifying this.

However, do you wish to comment on why you have taken away a lot of usage allowance from your 20CN customers, and at the same time given more to the rest of your users?

I can understand taking away some of the 20CN allowance - mistakes can be made, 20CN is expensive, I understand that - but to then go and give other users extra...surely you can see how this could be viewed as a slap in the face to your seemingly less important 20CN customers?

I've just scrapped my reply which I had already altered a few times before deciding there is something that doesn't hold water there.

AAISP seem good at tariff structures, barring the mistake they seem to have made on Jan 1 about the levels, as someone has already commented, but lousy at explaining things to anyone who doesn't already fully understand what they are trying to explain. ( Have I explained that clearly? ).

What seems to have happened is a (new) clear distinction being drawn between 6pm-midnight and midnight to 9am. Unless your usage charts had this split in the past?

I don't however see the need for the (6-12 Mon-Fri) against the 20CN evening. From what I think we have been told so far then it should just say (6-12). In fact I don't see the need for that line at all. Surely it is included in off-peak? It certainly seems the customer needs to add it to the off-peak figure.

The problem with that is that they seem to be rounding the byte counts on each line to tenths of a unit. If those are then added to get the total for the month, then the addition of two rounded amounts (within the off-peak tariff) is likely to give an incorrect result, possibly affecting the user by 5GB.

Adding the rounded amount for off-peak to the rounded amount for peak is legitimate. That is the declared policy and makes sense. It is the splitting of off-peak first and adding rounded amounts within it that worry me.

Edit - From Shaun's post the 2am-6am 1TB per unit slot is continuing past 1 April.

Edited by RobertoS (Thu 11-Feb-10 14:16:51)

I wish they would just go back to the allowances before the new tarrifs came in to be honest.
They obviously worked (for 20cn anyway).

This new move just screams of, "oops we made a mistake, and now you're going to pay for it"

I really like aaisp, but in the short time i've been here it's been pretty confusing lol.

In reply to a post by Eggplant0001:

[...[b]reducing our 20CN by half, yet increasing 21CN usage allowance?!

i have been trying to follow the discussion on their irc channel. Think I have got it correctly but no doubt a staff member will correct me if I am wrong.

It seems that 21CN and 20CN lines are in the ratio 50/50

Evening usage is higher on 21CN as well and hitting the top but its cheaper to maintain the necessary headroom on 21CN.

the page shot up before I thought to write down the difference in costings but they were very large indeed.

Someone has said that BT are possibly targeting the exchanges with the highest total users for upgrade which possibly means more businessess on 21 CN..

Interesting that 21CN evening usage is very high as well though yet their allowance has increased.

My crystal ball tells me that there are more alterations to come, seems this change to units has messed up them and us.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

What seems to have happened is a (new) clear distinction being drawn between 6pm-midnight and midnight to 9am. Unless your usage charts had this split in the past?

I don't however see the need for the (6-12 Mon-Fri) against the 20CN evening. From what I think we have been told so far then it should just say (6-12). In fact I don't see the need for that line at all. Surely it is included in off-peak? It certainly seems the customer needs to add it to the off-peak figure.

This was explained in the status post of 7/2/2010 which said:
"Some time soon (probably next weekend) we'll start breaking down the usage metering in finer detail - e.g. how much is evening, night, and weekend. This is not a change to billing or usage per unit. It means we are collecting more detailed data on how people use the services at different times of day. It will also break down off peak by line type as we do for peak usage."

Seems pretty clear to me
Terry

Edited by TerryN (Thu 11-Feb-10 17:20:49)

I'll try and answer any questions.

1. The breakdown on the usage stats is not a change to tariffs. It gives more detail, If it is causing too much confusion I'll just make the report aggregate them again if you like. TBH I thought it may be useful!

2. The mix of the general off peak (all lines) and specific 20CN evening, 20CN night, etc, is just because the extra breakdown detail we added mid-month. So you have un-segregated use before and segregated after-wards. There is "weekend" as well, as you will see on Saturday.I did announce that, honest!

3. The 20CN being lower usage is basically that the change on 1st Jan was clearly a bit of a mistake and usage in evenings has rocketed. It may be related to the tariff change or other factors. We are trying to catch up on that and get back to un-congested (fast) links for all customers and that is taking a few days to get right. Sorry for the delay there.

4. The 21CN peak increase is really to make the whole lot fit better. We pay (more than) twice as much for 20CN as 21CN to BT. It is crazy. 21CN pricing has in fact improved a little lately so we are passing that on. Also evening usage is increasing so this may encourage more balanced usage.

We will always consider adjusting tariffs to make sure that things are sensible and that we have a sustainable business model.

In reply to a post by TerryN:

Seems pretty clear to me

We have the following statements:-

20CN night (12-9) - Rate 100GB
20CN evening (6-12 M-F) - Rate 100GB
Peak/Daytime usage is 9am to 6pm, Monday to Friday. Off peak is all other times.

We also have the following example in an earlier post:-

This month Bytes Rate Units
Off peak (all line types) 813,165,221 100GB 0.01
20CN night (12-9) 182,234,592 100GB 0.00
20CN daytime (9-6 M-F) 1,674,559,660 1GB 1.67
20CN evening (6-12 M-F) 76,835,201 100GB 0.00

The logic of the statements is that the 76,835,201 bytes and the 182,234,592 bytes are included in the Off peak 813,165,221 bytes.

The total usage by the poster so far is 1,674,559,660 plus 813,165,221 bytes.

That is absolutely clear. But is it correct?

Sorry if I'm confusing the issue RevK, but it does seem unclear.

If I'm right in what I said to TerryN a few minutes ago, then the confusion would go away if the 20CN (or whatever) evening and 20CN night came first, then a new "Other off-peak", then Total off-peak, then 20CN daytime.

The trouble with what you show at the moment is it seems two of the figures are part of off-peak, but the rest of off-peak isn't identified. Nothing adds up, therefore it is unclear.

It's hard to explain what I mean. Essentially I think I'm trying to say if you give a breakdown of a number, then all the items that add up to that number must be shown, even if one of the items is a catch-all as I suggest above.

Edited by RobertoS (Thu 11-Feb-10 18:38:40)

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

The total usage by the poster so far is 1,674,559,660 plus 813,165,221 bytes.
That is absolutely clear. But is it correct?

Yes it is.
Or 1.68 units

Trouble is that the culture of AAISP is to make as much information as possible available to their customers (everything from CSV files of usage stats to graphs showing radius blips).

Anyway, hopefully RevK's comments have made things a little clearer.

Terry

Ah, I suspect I have really [censored] ordering on that report. I'll see what I can do for that.
It was not meant to be confusing, honest!

What you are trying to do is great. Just the presentation to an outsider (ie prospective or newly-gained customer) isn't always as clear as it could be.

Writing a description of something you know all about, for someone who knows nothing about it, is one of the hardest things there is. So I'm not trying to cause trouble, just raise questions where things are unclear from the outside. (At least to me!)

Similarly, the normal ISP-hunter isn't going to be looking at your blogs and News Items where some confusions are resolved.

OK Stats re-ordered - any better.

I agree. Hard to describe.

What I try to stress is we really are not trying to hide anything or rip off anyone.

We want to be fair, open and honest. People naturally assume there is a catch (I always do!), and so that does not help. But tricky to get around that.

Stats reorganised The information on the page is actually stupendous

This month Bytes Rate Units
20CN daytime (9-6 M-F) 3,049,362,507 1GB 3.05
20CN evening (6-12 M-F) 129,232,387 100GB 0.00
20CN night (12-9) 182,234,592 100GB 0.00
Off peak (all line types) 813,165,221 100GB 0.01

Edited by deleted (Thu 11-Feb-10 21:36:03)

In reply to a post by RevK:

OK Stats re-ordered - any better.

Much better

In reply to a post by daryon:

I wish they would just go back to the allowances before the new tarrifs came in to be honest.
They obviously worked (for 20cn anyway).

This new move just screams of, "oops we made a mistake, and now you're going to pay for it"

I really like aaisp, but in the short time i've been here it's been pretty confusing lol.

Agreed.

Existing users were also told that they could stay on the old tariffs if they wanted but they would be losing out but no problem.

http://aaisp.blogspot.com/2009/10/info-not-liking-ch...

However, if we really do get negative comments I am sure we can make a system that retains the existing system for those that want it. They will be worse off, but if that really is what people want we can do that I am sure.

Hmmmmmm ...... I'd rather have stayed worse off in that case.

I'm not going to gripe over it though and just bite the bullet, I am not stupid and know the differences in costings with 20CN over 21CN. A big influx of users to AAISP has obviously not helped either as the ever growing higher usage stats indicate for the evenings.

The customer service I've received, especially tracing line faults over the past few months, has been second to none and way beyond any other ISP I've ever known (Thanks again Shaun! ) and I'd rather pay a small premium and stay than save money and get that awful drowning feeling with another ISP.

*Edit

Having just seen IdNet's increased allowances on their packages though there are other options now it seems. Interesting indeed .........

Edited by deleted (Fri 12-Feb-10 07:20:05)

I wish OFCOM would step in here BT are blatantly using 21cn as an excuse to give millions of users who don't even have dates for their exchanges a royal shafting (via their ISPs of course who will no doubt get the blame, clever BT very clever)

We still have no date here so I have no doubt it won't be before the end of 2011 at the earliest and in the meantime the remaining 20cn users continue to get the [censored] end of the stick in both price and allowance

This by no means a dig at AAISP they can't control their wholesale price but BT need a slap here and again I have no doubt it won't happen

I completely agree. My local exchange has no pending date for the 21CN update, nor is there any LLU presence, so like many people I'm stuck using 20CN connections and limited to 8mbit. Luckily I live really close to the exchange and sync at 8128/832, so I'm better off than most.

I completely understand that it's becoming more expensive to run 20CN for AAISP and, although a little disheartened about the new off-peak rates, I do understand. I'm on 11 units a month, but that's mostly due to ensuring I have enough on-peak available, if I need to download anything I generally do it between 2-6am when it's very cheap to do so.

I can see how the change to units based billing has caused issues with capacity. When I heard about it the first thing I thought was "if I go easy on-peak I can do even more off-peak" which I'm sure everyone else did too. It seems the change was both a good and bad thing. There has been the odd occasion recently where I've seen my line running slower than usual (throughput, not sync speed), but I trust AAISP's statement of always aiming to have enough capacity for everyone, it's been the case ever since I signed up, and I'm sure they'll find the needed balance soon.

AAISP are so far above any other ISP I've been with that I can't see myself migrating to anyone else, their customer support and openness about issues and their business are simply unmatched in the industry. Whilst I probably could get a cheaper deal elsewhere, I prefer to know that I'm paying for a quality service where help is available when I need it, for that I'd gladly pay the extra I do.

Keep up the great work

In reply to a post by NeoLojik:

AAISP are so far above any other ISP I've been with that I can't see myself migrating to anyone else, their customer support and openness about issues and their business are simply unmatched in the industry. Whilst I probably could get a cheaper deal elsewhere, I prefer to know that I'm paying for a quality service where help is available when I need it, for that I'd gladly pay the extra I do.

Keep up the great work

Couldn't have put it better myself.

I must admit to being very tempted by IdNet's new allowances, it would mean never having to worry when using the www in the daytime for me as 30GB would be miles more than I need even if peak does not end until midnight 7 day's a week. Gotta be honest, I considered jumping ship for that earlier today ......

I am sure IdNet are an excellent ISP and come highly recommended by many esteemed members of this forum but after 15 minutes consideration I bit the bullet and added another unit to my AAISP package in early readiness for the change of rate come April. Unless something goes very wrong in the future I'm more than happy to stay put too.

Well I'm still going to be recommending AAISP, and IDNet where appropriate. Here is ideal for someone who is out at work Mon-Fri.

My exchange is on its 3rd date (31/03/2010) , the first 2 having passed only to later have a new date set.The original date was a year ago next week. It is almost as though BT is trying to discourage usage of BT wholesale and get people to move to one of the seven LLU operators which Samknows lists as being available from my exchange.