Speed restriction

I got an e-mail last month off BT stating that I had reached 80gb usage for the month of June... this was followed by another saying I had reached 100gb and so for August during peak times I would be restricted to 1mb speeds from my usual 7.5mb.

This annoyed me abit as I've been with BT for around 4 years now and my habits have never really changed, but I suppose I had done a fair bit of downloading so I stuck with it.

Anyway during this month (August) I have made sure not to be excessive. I downloaded a 17gb sound effects collection and just streamed some BBC and 4OD stuff.

So I load my e-mail up this evening and have one timed at 13.56 saying that I had reached 80gb. I have no idea how I reached that amount but thought okay... I'll be careful for the next 4 days.... 10 hours later I have an e-mail I have used over 100gb! I had not even done anything during those 10 hours, no streaming videos, no downloading of torrents... NOTHING!

Now I'm restricted for another month, I installed the usage monitor on my main PC that I download stuff onto and for the month of August I recieved 39gb of info, but that also includes files I drag onto that PC so I would say I have probably recieved around 30gb off the net in august and there is no way I have streamed abother 60gb off 4OD or BBC iPlayer... any suggestions... I am really annoyed now becasue the restriction is messing up being able to watch stuff on BBC and 4OD and there is no way I have used 100gb combination of up and download.

Cheers for listening/reading...

AJ

Is the wireless connection on your router unsecured?

That's interesting, we've just had exactly the same thing and pretty well at the same times. After getting the first email we deliberately didn't let the kids go online so there is no way we used 20GB in 10 hours. The routers are all secure so I think a phone call to BT on Monday to see what is happening,

I think BT's system is a little broken... suprise!

I had an email either thurs or fri saying we'd hit 80gig this month blah... only this time I've been checking and our combined up/down traffic to that point was only just over 56gig...

I've seen on other forums people getting it as well that swear they've only used 17gig or other numbers... but can't rule out compromised wireless or how good their useage accountability is.

Its possibly BT are also counting in unsolicited traffic like port scans tho I can't imagine it would add up to that much extra.

On the plus side - for now our connection is back to acceptable quality... still a little bit of packetless but within reasonable levels, low pings all through the day and never drops below 2Mbit at peak times - which is completely useable... fingers crossed aslong as we stay below 100gig it will remain like this - I can live with that.

EDIT: Got mine "Friday, 28 August, 2009 3:15 PM" either they only send warnings out in batches, which makes it a bit hard to manage your useage if theres a long delay or its a bit strange we all get a warning the same day.

Edited by deleted (Sat 29-Aug-09 14:08:05)

Well it's interesting to know, but I have been so annoyed with them I've just got my MAC code and ordered O2 instead.

Getting my MAC code took 3 seperate phone calls. It just annoys me that a company like BT don't give you the means to monitor your usage where as someone like ADSL24 (who a friend of mine is with) have a really good web system that shows you.

Let's hope O2 is plain sailing

O2 Access or O2 LLU?

Make sure you properlly cancel your BT account (not connection) when you've finished migrating... or you'll continue to be charged.

Hope its O2 LLU as thats on easynet I think and quite good, otherwise their IPStream isn't much different to BT.

In reply to a post by Rroff:

Hope its O2 LLU as thats on easynet I think and quite good, otherwise their IPStream isn't much different to BT.

O2 LLU is Be/O2 !!!!!

Nothing whatsoever to do with Easynet. (Unless some backhaul is involved somewhere).

I thought they all used easynet for backhaul - not something I've looked into tho just some random info thats floating in the back of my mind.

EDIT: Ooops think I'm getting confused with sky.

Edited by deleted (Sat 29-Aug-09 14:48:37)

In reply to a post by Rroff:

I thought they all used easynet for backhaul - not something I've looked into tho just some random info thats floating in the back of my mind.

EDIT: Ooops think I'm getting confused with sky.

Indeed . Sky owns Easynet.

O2 Access where I am... will keep a close eye on my BT account once migrated over...

A friend of mine has been on it for quite awhile and seems to be happy.

Edited by ajfromuk (Sat 29-Aug-09 14:57:32)

Hmmm re O2 Access.

Keep a close watch on it in the first 3 weeks, as you have 30 days to get out if it isn't good. Then in contract for the rest of the 12 months.

When it's good it is fine. But tends to go in short good spells and long poor spells - they gain customers so it gets congested, then they upgrade the kit, then they gain customers ....

Good luck though.

PS - what exchange is it?

I'm on the Aberconwy exchange

It's worth a try on that exchange, but don't forget my previous post. There are other reasonable allowance-based ISPs that may suit if it goes yucky.

I've had the same thing in July, BT claimed that I downloaded over 100gb in the month. This includes ( I found out after a few phone calls) 25Gb between 1/7 and 7/7, this I found really ironic as I wasn't in the UK between theses dates and my Home hub was disconnected from my home network (all pc's turned off) and I took a note of what had been downloaded according to the hub when I went on holiday (mid june) and when I got back the differece was about 10Mb (up & download). BT eventually said it may be a "computer error"

I've just had one of these emails. Alarmed, I checked my hub. That tells me that it has been connected for some 26 days and the totals up and down amount to 12820.47 Mb. This means they are telling me that in the space of the five or six previous days the traffic was over 86 Gb! I think. Aside for me having no recollection of having some need that could have created that much traffic I wonder if that figure is actually possible in the real world.

Me thinks a phone call is in order.

I've seen quite a few posts around the web of similiar... enough that even if some people aren't telling the truth or don't have accurate accounting of their bandwidth, BT deffinatly doesn't have an accurate account of peoples' bandwidth useage.

Hi did a google search and found this thread. I recieved the 80GB Warning on Friday 28th August at 1:36pm and therefore stopped using my pc and stopped my sister using the Internet until idealy the 1st of September. Well on Sunday 30th I was notified that I had downloaded over 100gb and am now restricted which has really annoyed me. The only access to the internet I have used is with my iPhone since I got the warning just to check mail and Twitter! So unless my iPhone is secretly downloading 20GB in 2 days there seems to be somthing fishy going on!
I plan to call BT tommorrow and have this out with them. I just wondered if any of you have called them today and what they said so I know what to expect.

Mark

Update:

Rang BT at 10:30 this morning was on hold for 5min and got through to a nice Scottish guy. Told him the Warning email was sent on Friday and the restiction 100gb usage was sent Sunday and that I understand and agree with the fair usage policy (I don't agree with it but best to keep them sweet) but I said I felt that the warning was far too late and there is no way in 2 days I had used 20gb.

He agreed and said a system error has sent the warnings out to many people far too late to give me chance to moderate my usage and that my restiction will NOT be activated this month unless I exceed 100gb in September! He implied all users with the late email wouldn't be restricted but then asked me for my details and said the restriction has been removed so if anyone else gets this give them a ring and say you weren't warned with enough time if they only gave you a couple of days!

Also he referred me to this website saying download a meter - something which I believe bt should provide as I use 5 devices that connect to the internet so an overall meter would be better!

Mark

Hi chrisgr1962,

That isnt good please can you PM me with your account details and I will look into this for you.

Thanks

Fionnuala

BT Support

Hi fionnuala,

If you had clicked on the "Reply" button against Chris's post it would have been better . Some of us use (default to) threaded mode and you appear to have replied to a post by Rroff on Saturday.

Also a lot of people set the system to send them an email notification when they have a reply. So if the two posters had that on, you would have caused an email to Rroff and chris wouldn't have got one so possibly not seen your post for a while.

If you click the Threaded button at the top right you will see what I mean. Then click it again when it says Flat to get back to where you are now.

I recieved an email today (which is now into Sept. saying I had now exceeded 100gig in August) ok thier system is prolly lagged a bit... thing is

(a) by my calculations we've only used slightly over 60gig during august - these are SNMP scrapes off the routers' wan interface which aren't 100% accurate but close enough.

(b) I was the only one here between the time of being sent the 80gig warning and the 100gig hit emails - everyone else took off for a long weekend from early fri to late mon to make the most of the bankholiday and all PCs were off except mine... there is absolutely no way I used 20gig in that time - I worked a double shift friday and had to work the bankholidy so my PC was off most of those 2 days as well.

What bothers me most is theres no incentive on BT for the user to manage useage... you still get penalised for using it off peak and if you know your gonna be throttled to 1Mbit most of the time you might as well put the connection to other types of use - can still hit 300gig down alone in a month at 1Mbit/s... while less bandwidth intensive over a long period applications are restricted due to the cap.

Edited by deleted (Tue 01-Sep-09 17:30:57)

I totally agree with Rroff, I tend to use the internet between 11pm and 3am so pretty much outside the peak times. I do this to keep my speeds up and not get hit by internet traffic. I do all my downloads like Game Demos, Patches, Windows Software from MSDNAA and my catch up like iPlayer around 1am to 3am so they will download quickly and I wont be effecting others but I still get slammed by BT for doing this! I wouldn't mind them restricting my speed if during peak I was using a high amount traffic during this time but I don't.

Also BT need to think about implementing a method we can see our usage. I have multiple computers and 2 iPhones that connect to the wireless I cant have a meter on each one and go around adding it all up! Come on BT get your act together I say.

Hi all
No I didn't get the email notification but just reading through the forum as speed is now limited and I can't play any decent online games. I've PM'ed BT_Care so will see what happens next.