Cerberus FTTPoD Order

About to pull the trigger with Cerberus. Will provide updates on here on how things went.

I am actually ordering via my business so will be on the 36month contract.

Let me know if you have any questions.

The price quoted was as per their website. I am in Band B looking at £2000 installation.

Whereabouts in the country are you Snake ?

I live in Seven Kings (Ilford - East London), my nearest cabinet is supposed to be cabinet 31.

Edited by Snake (Tue 05-Sep-17 21:29:10)

OK, not an area I know. Fingers crossed for you ....

Like they used to say on the Waltzers, 'scream if you want to go faster'.

Are they offering you truly unlimited usage (ie without any FUP or AUP) on their FTTPoD package? If unsure, I would get that clarified (preferably put into contract) before you sign on the dotted line. They are telling some people its a truly unlimited service yet others have been told there's a 750GB AUP limit per month.

I have the terms and conditions and there is NO mention of a FUP or an AUP, nothing even remotely close to any sort of usage policy, apart from the fact that you are not allowed to resell.

The actual description of the product says:

Cerberus FTTP on Demand - 330Mbps Downstream, 30Mbps upstream, Uncapped, 1 IP, 36 Month Contract

Thanks, yet here (second from bottom):

https://www.cerberusnetworks.co.uk/connectivity-broa...

it clearly states "unlimited usage (subject to AUP)"

However if there's absolutely no mention of "AUP" or "FUP" in your agreement then you're probably ok and should be fine to download TBs of data per month if required

Anyway good luck with the installation, if you already have u/g ducts in your area which aren't donkeys years old then your service shouldn't take too long to install and you should be up and running within 3-4 months. Mine was ordered in February and went live in June.

Thanks for the link, I have got in email (in writing) stating the following:

"The data is truly unlimited. There is no fair use policy and no acceptable use policy. In this respect, it is akin to a leased line, where you will also expect these things to be absent."

I live in Greater London so I would assume the ducting and stuff is already in place.

If its akin to a leased line they will be able to you your committed bit rate across their network i.e. you should never see a test to a server on their network dip below this speed

I think he was just trying to make a point. Its not a Leased line and I know that.

They have been very upfront about the miscommunication etc... and so I have asked all the questions regarding FUP/AUP and I have responses in writing. I have read the T&C's and also searched them and there is nothing regards FUP/AUP or any limits.

If this came about later on it would be a new contract issue and at that point I would be having a different discussion.

@MrSaffron, have you spoken to anyone at Cerberus to confirm what their service offering looks like. This would help immensely to clarify any confusion.

Will they all allow you to pay the one-off installation charges by credit card (at least £100) in order to get S75 protection?

Yes, I can pay all of the install and even the initial rental if I choose to by credit card.

Their website clearly states "Unlimited usage (subject to AUP)".

This company really does not seem to know what they are doing and I am confident this will end up with problems.

Their pricing makes zero sense. They will be selling the service at a loss when you factor in what it costs them for the rental + the backhaul.

If they were to offer it as a truly unlimited service with no AUP, then one heavy user could do some serious damage.

Yes the website does, but sometimes companies are slow to update their website. Happens all the time with Amazon, where you see amazing deals only to get told it wasn't the correct price etc...

In regards to their pricing. I am not sure why it doesn't make sense? because they are only making £30 roughly on top of what Openreach charges wholesale?

The whole cost is the cost they pay, they only have to pay back haul cost if they didn't have their own equipment which they do, from my discussions with Martin at Cerberus.

The company has been around since 2006.

At the end of the day, if they install the fiber and go bust in a few months time, I have FTTP installed I can move somewhere else. If they don't great.

If they say we have AUP, I have a contract which doesn't mention AUP and I have emails from the account manager stating the same.

I am not sure what else you would want? their business model? LOL

In reply to a post by Snake:

In regards to their pricing. I am not sure why it doesn't make sense? because they are only making £30 roughly on top of what Openreach charges wholesale?

The whole cost is the cost they pay, they only have to pay back haul cost if they didn't have their own equipment which they do, from my discussions with Martin at Cerberus.

Openreach is only the connection from your premises to the exchange. Cerberus then need to get their network connected to this exchange. There are two ways to do this:

1) They buy a 1G port (£2,000 +VAT for the connection) and then purchase EAD/EA to connect their nearest POP to this exchange. This is not a cheap option and you normally only get ISPs who have large numbers of customers doing this (Sky, TT, Zen etc.).

2) They use BT Wholesale's WBC and WBMC Aggregated or Shared. The only option here would be WBMC Shared because the other two require you to purchase aggregation points around the country (again for larger ISPs who have a nationwide presence). With WBMC Shared, you need to purchase a set amount of bandwidth at £48.55 per Mbit/s per month. On top of that, you need to buy a connection (host link) to connect your network to the nearest BT Wholesale POP (prices range from £25-55k per year for this).

Now a 330/30 line will not be fully saturated all the time, but you would need to make a calculation as to the usage to know how much bandwidth to buy from BT Wholesale. If you exceed the amount of purchased bandwidth, then the costs jump massively.

I can say with confidence that £30 per month is no way near enough to cover an unlimited usage package for a small ISP. There is a very good reason why small ISPs cannot offer unlimited services. One heavy user can cost them thousands a month in backhaul charges from BT Wholesale.

Fluidone is also unlimited and they making about £150 I don't think that would cover the costs either.

The reality is we won't know agreements are in place so it's only going to be guessing.

I'll update as I learn more

In reply to a post by Snake:

The company has been around since 2006.

If you look on companieshouse.gov.uk you will see:

Persons with significant control
SPITZHORN CONSULTING LIMITED

Governing law
British Virgin Island

Nature of control
Ownership of shares � More than 50% but less than 75%

Is FluidOne truly unlimited with no AUP?

Cerberus won't have any special agreements with Openreach or BT Wholesale, that I am 100% sure of. There is no speculation as the prices are black and white for all ISPs.

Cerberus seem to tell different people different things which does not give you much confidence in my opinion.

Thats fine, most companies who want to reduce their "tax" would have an off shore shareholder.

So an update, I just got sent over the documents to sign and there is an AUP.

The AUP doesn't state any sort of cap. However it does have clauses on excessive usage etc....

Which based on some comments here is to be expected. My disappointment is when asking clearly is there an AUP and being told there isn't then being sent one. I appreciate there isn't cap as such, and this AUP is place to protect from abusers, but I would have liked to be told upfront about this.

Nothing else has really changed, but I am thinking about what to do next.

If they don't define excessive then that is a clause that can be abused by them. I wouldn't want to sign up to a contract for 3 years where "excessive usage" was not clearly defined.

So, I have decided to take the plunge.

I have looked at Zen and they have a similar policy and the excessive usage isn't defined.

I had a look at how much data I have used and the most I have ever used is 3TB in one month, otherwise I am normally around 1TB.

So I don't think I will be affected in anyway.

Martin from Cerberus has been really good with communication and he did call me to clarify it was his mistake not realizing there was an AUP. However as this this seems to be standard with ALL ISP's, I thought why not take the plunge

I'll update to let you know how I get on.

its not unlimited, unlimited means no limits. If it subject to things like an AUP then there is a limit of some sort.

But we cannot do anything as it seems it has to be called "true unlimited" to be actually unlimited.

In reply to a post by AndyHCZ:

<snip>
2) They use BT Wholesale's WBC and WBMC Aggregated or Shared. The only option here would be WBMC Shared
<snip>

Possible 3 = they rent backhaul from TT like A&A do?

From their website, https://www.cerberusnetworks.co.uk/CoP where there is a link to: https://www.cerberusnetworks.co.uk/AUP about 3/4 of the way down.

Cheers!

Yep, I've read and signed up. Now let's see how it goes. &#128512;

In reply to a post by Snake:

&#128512;

I was using my iPhone to post the message and used the emoji from the Apple device. Didn't realise that's happens.

Biggest regret u ever sign up with Cerberus. I wouldn't risk FTTPoD with subject to AUP as I don't care what Cerberus telling you it unlimited data. Not true. LOOK BELOW CAREFULLY:

6. What about excessive network usage?
6.1. Where services are supplied with an unlimited monthly usage policy, and it is determined that any customers Internet activities are so excessive that other customers are detrimentally affected, Cerberus may give the customer generating the excessive traffic a written warning (by email or otherwise). In extreme circumstances, should the levels of activity not immediately decrease after the warning, Cerberus may terminate that customer�s services.
6.2. Services subject to a monthly usage allowance will be billed at the rate of £1 per GB of additional data use over and above the allowance for that month.

So, once u hitting 750GB data every month, a warning letter might sent to u!

Edited by adslmax (Wed 06-Sep-17 18:40:16)

They haven't defined a amount, where are you getting 750GB from?

I've been Zen for 4 years and never had an issue: here is there AUP

https://www.zen.co.uk/policies.aspx?page=10673

They also don't define excessive. I am sure other ISP are the same.

Also common sense would dictate the amount of monthly bandwidth that would be considered excessive. On 330mb connection running 24/7 downloading. You could download 200TB. So I'm guessing if they were to highlight something excessive it would be a percentage of that maybe 40% of that 200TB (40TB)

I am not sure what ISP you are with and how much you bandwidth your consuming. I am less worried about the bandwidth consumption, as I've stated previously the most I've ever downloaded in a month is about 3/4TB, I am more interested in the speed.

Thanks for the warning though.

In reply to a post by Snake:

otherwise I am normally around 1TB.

If you haven't already, I strongly recommend asking Cerberus if your normal monthly usage of ~ 1TB doesn't fall foul of their AUP - preferably get confirmation via email in case they kick up a stink later. As Max says they have told some potential customers that their AUP is 750gb monthly (just like they told many people that their monthly rental for FTTPoD is £90) so better to be sure than sorry...

Edited by deleted (Wed 06-Sep-17 19:46:48)

I did ask them and they did say 4Tb isn't a lot.

I don't have it writing, however if I was told later about the 750GB. I have in writing stating clearly there is no 750GB limit, I would have a very strong case for breach of contract and misleading me into a sale.

Have Fluidone stated what their AUP usage is? It would be good to have a comparison.

At the end of the day I think nothing will happen, I'll get a great service pay a good price and move on. In a few months provide an update and next minute otherwise will jump on Cerberus.

In reply to a post by Snake:

I did ask them and they did say 4Tb isn't a lot.

Fair do's

In reply to a post by Snake:

Have Fluidone stated what their AUP usage is? It would be good to have a comparison.

According to my account manager at Fluidone my FTTPoD service is "truly unlimited" which I would expect for a package costing £300 pm. However I try "not to be a dick" as Adrian Kennard (Director of AAISP) so eloquently puts it LOL

http://www.revk.uk/2017/09/dont-be-dick.html

The line, "try not.to be a dick" hits the nail on the head. I think that's what people need to realise. All of these connections go onto some shared infrastructure and so there has to be some common sense.

I would have gone with Fluidone, but I didn't for two reasons.

1. I have to use their £800 router - I prefer my Pfsense Xeon-d based mini server (10GBE)
2. I didn't want to stretch to £300 a month.

The install cost are more or less the same. So I pulled the trigger let's see how it all goes. I'm hoping they break the record with my installation, in terms of quick they get it competed.

If it was baby_frogmella to decide which one to go for? Fluidone £300+ a month or Cerberus £150+ a month as I do think baby_frogmella will go for fluidone instead because it more professional business than cerberus.

But I be very surprise if your with cerberus has gone pass 36 months with £150 a month with no warning letter about usage then fair enough, you put a brave decision to go for cerberus because of cheaper monthly payment with AUP policy on it with the usage excess with a small businesss.

In reply to a post by adslmax:

So, once u hitting 750GB data every month, a warning letter might sent to u!

FTTPoD is a business product. The excessive limit for a business will be far beyond that of a consumer product.

Well at first cerberus was telling us FTTPoD was pricing at £87 per month, AUP policy of 750GB and now they saying removing 750GB and put up pricing FTTPoD £150 a month.

That's NOT a business professional at all. Fluidone remain the same everything what they say on the website!

So, I got a feeling Cerberus later on might say 'Oh we have to change AUP policy of 1000GB per month or put the price at £250 per month'.

I don't trust Cerberus at all.

No one is asking you to trust or buy anything from Cerberus. I thank you for your concern, but now that I am going ahead with the order, I can provide factual information as it stands today.

I think when baby_frogmella was ordering his install Cerberus didn't offer the product. However everyone has to make their own decisions.

I'll obviously let the forum know if I get a letter and also what my monthly usage is. However I am not expecting to get anything and intact being positive about Cerberus as a competitor to Fluidone.

It's better we have more ISP's then just one.

This has tears written all over it in my opinion.

I will be surprised if they proceed with your order or don't come up with "Openreach has increased prices", but let's see.

Ok, it your money & your own decision at the end. I do hope Cerberus going to stick with their promise of wording to you. More likely after sales, they don't wanna to know, just after money and you will stuck with 3 years no get out of jail.

In reply to a post by AndyHCZ:

This has tears written all over it in my opinion.

I will be surprised if they proceed with your order or don't come up with "Openreach has increased prices", but let's see.

£165/month. If they haven't unbundled the exchange there is no way they're going to be able to charge that.

If they have unbundled the exchange maybe, if they deliver it as wires only with nothing special?

They're kidding themselves if they claim 4 TB a month isn't much. That's still a lot of data even by business standards.

If Openreach increase their prices I can cancel the order. If the prices increase after the contract has started, it would be a standard 30 days notice and I would be able to leave. So I cannot see the second happening.

I am not sure why you think this has tears all over it? I don't understand the hate against Cerberus.

Several people spoke to them and decided against it. I am taking the plunge, if anything goes wrong, it will be my decision. I am not quite sure what your expecting me to say...

"some random people on a forum told me x, based on y comments and so I should listen to them" its a risk I know but anything new would be a risk.

The fact is cheaper is better at least if things go pear shape I can exit, even if I have to pay out the fees, its still less then Fluidone.

I am assuming if all is well in 6 months time all these people will come on the forum and be like hey we were wrong?

Agreed, 4TB is a lot and I was in a middle of migrating from Dropbox to Google Drive. However Zen didn't blink. They have the same AUP as Cerberus in terms of being vague around exceeding. I think its just depends on your overall average.


But I don't agree 4TB is a lot for a business. I am on the Zen business package - maybe that's why they didn't say anything.

In regards to how they are doing the costing. I don't have the details of the commercials and to be honest why should I care? If the install happens, I have FTTP, if it doesn't I haven't lost anything.

If later they say whoops our fault we made a mistake with the price, I can leave, again nothing to lose and just pay install fee and move to any normal FTTP offering.

I am protected against loss of payment, as I am using my credit card.

No company is going to come here and tell you what commercial agreements they have in place.

Honestly it sounds like a little bit of jealousy to me.

Hehe, nothing to be jealous about. I will be paying £165+VAT. I am currently paying £75 to Zen. Both are business products and so well above the normal residential rates.

If you want/need it, then you have to be willing to pay for it. I just wasn't willing to go to £300+vat a month.

In reply to a post by tomse43:

Honestly it sounds like a little bit of jealousy to me.

None from here. Nearly purchased it myself before they jacked the prices up but no way I'm going to pay that much for broadband. I still could, but other home upgrades will take precedence.

Virgin Media just built to my area and once it's made live I'll be on 'Voom 3' anyway, and I know the road map for speed increases so I'm all good

In reply to a post by Snake:

Hehe, nothing to be jealous about. I will be paying £165+VAT. I am currently paying £75 to Zen. Both are business products and so well above the normal residential rates.

If you want/need it, then you have to be willing to pay for it. I just wasn't willing to go to £300+vat a month.

That's right. Just seems some others are trying to pick every little problem with it which is unfair.

In reply to a post by Snake:

If later they say whoops our fault we made a mistake with the price, I can leave, again nothing to lose and just pay install fee and move to any normal FTTP offering.

I'm expecting that to come before you get to the installation.

Is there anything in the contract that they can terminate before then?

In reply to a post by Snake:

No company is going to come here and tell you what commercial agreements they have in place.

I think you're missing the fact that this is a heavily regulated industry with transparent pricing.

Re: bandwidth costs, do you happen to know why BT Wholesale charge more than their smaller competitors? For example the smaller well known niche ISPs such as those below only offer unlimited (or high) usage on their non-BT Wholesale backhaul services without eye watering prices...this clearly suggests that BT bandwidth costs more:

Uno/Xilo: TalkTalk LLU & Vodafone LLU
Pulse8: TalkTalk LLU
AAISP: TalkTalk LLU
IDNet: Zen LLU
Zen: Zen LLU
Spectrum Internet (incl FTTPoD services): Spectrum LLU

The only reason I can think of is that Ofcom won't allow BT Wholesale to undercut their rivals despite being the biggest carrier in the country.

I doubt they would be able to unbundle an exchange unless they have a large number customers on the exchange.

I think they are using BT Wholesale for the backhaul as their checker is using the BTw XML.

I just cannot put any faith into what this company has on its website. They are offering two speed variants of FTTP which don't even go live with Openreach until next week and then with BT Wholesale they will be in a test phase.

The fact that all their prices for FTTP/G.fast are quoted as wire's only is even more suspicious. 330/50 will cost them £55.00 a month alone rental from BTw and they charge the end user £80.00? £25 a month to cover all the backhaul and overheads of a 330/50 line? Good luck.

There isn't actually a massive price difference between TT's backhaul and BTw. If you look on YouTube, there is a "discussion" between Adrian Kennard and Neil McRae at one of the ISP conferences.

I believe there is more contract flexibility from TalkTalk which is one reason why smaller ISPs are preferring to use them over BT Wholesale.

The reason the cost is high is really down to the investment to build the backhaul I suspect. It cost over £1bn so I guess it's a matter of gaining a return on that investment.

No jealously, just pointing out some flaws in this company's pricing.

I've had FTTP for over 5 years.

I think we have to see what happens. Thanks for making the jump Snake, I'm looking forward to your updates.

I do hope u can proved everyone wrong including myself but I think Cerberus is a lying company who can't be trusted. Glad I didn't go ahead and order FTTPoD from Cerberus because I have very suspicious in them.

A company can have teething problems with a new product, marketing, sales not aligned with messaging is nothing new.

In reply to a post by AndyHCZ:

I believe there is more contract flexibility from TalkTalk which is one reason why smaller ISPs are preferring to use them over BT Wholesale.

In some areas yes, in others no and where not, their terms can be far worse.

Matt

Payment made via Credit card for installation - So that's not an issue.
Direct Debit setup for rental - This will start once service is online.

In reply to a post by AndyHCZ:

There isn't actually a massive price difference between TT's backhaul and BTw. If you look on YouTube, there is a "discussion" between Adrian Kennard and Neil McRae at one of the ISP conferences.

Thanks, I think its this youtube video in which Adrian Kennard from AAISP compares BT wholesale v TT wholesale networks and you're right, they're very similar both technically and from a pricing angle. He has a discussion with BT's Neil McRae in the Q&A session right at the end

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6OHDA47T_8g

Do you get the same level of credit card protection for a business purchase as for a consumer purchase? I understand the FTTPoD would only be sold to businesses due to Ofcom rules around contract lengths so also would assume that it would be contract law that would be applicable rather than consumer protection?

The protection provided by the credit cards is generally for the owner of the credit card so the person who can authorize the use of the card.

They don't get involved in what you do with the Money or who your buying stuff for.

Either way, my point was more to people saying they couldn't use their credit cards for payment, which clearly is not true.

In reply to a post by ian72:

Do you get the same level of credit card protection for a business purchase as for a consumer purchase? I understand the FTTPoD would only be sold to businesses due to Ofcom rules around contract lengths so also would assume that it would be contract law that would be applicable rather than consumer protection?

If a business credit card is used then there is no section 75 protection - if you use a consumer credit card to pay then it may not be protected either:

http://uk.creditcards.com/guides/guide-to-section-75...

Section 75 only applies to purchases made with credit in the capacity of a consumer. It does not therefore apply to Business credit cards and users of these products should not expect Section 75 protection. Theoretically, purchases made with a consumer credit card for business purposes would not be covered either..

Credit card protection is not cover for any business broadband as I was told by my local bank with my credit card company.

this goes back to when the adsl ports got a massive drop in prices to satisfy ofcom.

When adsl was first launched in the uk 1mbit ports cost more than 512kbit and 2mbit ports cost more than 1mbit, I think 2mbit adsl was something like £80 a month.

Ofcom as they are now like the sell em cheap pile it high product, so they persuaded BT to artifically not charge for burst speed, however BTs revenue needed protecting so they moved the cost to the backhaul, hence the very expensive BTw backhaul came about.

Since then 21CN has lowered pricing so its not so extreme anymore, but they remain more expensive likely to not been able to charge as much as they want for ports.

Edited by Chrysalis (Thu 07-Sep-17 21:18:06)

In reply to a post by Snake:

So an update, I just got sent over the documents to sign and there is an AUP.

The AUP doesn't state any sort of cap. However it does have clauses on excessive usage etc....

Which based on some comments here is to be expected. My disappointment is when asking clearly is there an AUP and being told there isn't then being sent one. I appreciate there isn't cap as such, and this AUP is place to protect from abusers, but I would have liked to be told upfront about this.

Nothing else has really changed, but I am thinking about what to do next.

You tell them, someone has done 13+TB on BT Infinity 2 and heard nothing (me in the past) so if they are gonna get arsey with the prices they charge, move on.

In reply to a post by Snake:

. You could download 200TB. So I'm guessing if they were to highlight something excessive it would be a percentage of that maybe 40% of that 200TB (40TB)

That would be 80TB - FWIW

This is fine, doesn't really matter to me, it was just to answer people saying you can't use credit card and needing protection. One of which I confirmed and it seems the other point was invalid anyway.

Is there anything to prevent them increasing prices during the contract term?

In reply to a post by Bill100:

Is there anything to prevent them increasing prices during the contract term?

Unless stated explicitly in the contract, ISPs are free to increase prices during contract term. I *think* you can leave a business contract with 30 days notice if this happens - same as a residential service but not 100% sure on this.

It's not the same protection for business contracts.

With a business contract, you have to provide evidence that a price increase is of 'material detriment' to you and your business. I have no idea how exactly you would prove something like this.

When I made a dummy order via the website, I was asked to sign a AUP contract.

This is the term about the usage - http://i.imgur.com/2FJvkIT.png

If they decide to terminate the service then it's a win for the customer?

There's no mention of the customer having to pay the remainder of the contract. They'd be free to take up a native FTTP product from a chosen provider?

I doubt it because it states in the main terms that the customer has to indemnify Cerberus of any penalties caused by a breach of the AUP.

Depends on the contract terms. The business may be required to cover Cerberus costs if they broke a clause in the contract.

Business contracts are covered by case law whereas consumer contracts have additional rights granted. Could be expensive legal processes to try and overturn clauses in a business contract.

your really stuck on this AUP aren't you? may I ask which provider you are with? So I can compare there AUP.

Where did you get that from? Not sure how many contracts you have worked with in the past. We had a Data Center contract and the provider wanted to increase the price, we were told we could give 30 days notice and leave, obviously for us that would be impossible to move 500 servers out and re-located within 30 days. In the end they agreed to give us three months and we left.

Any contract which is signed, is signed on the initial terms and conditions and pricing. Any changes to the contract has to be agreed by both parties.

Has anyone here had experience of prices going up during there initial contract period? Normally they increase the prices after your 12 month contract and your on a rolling contract.

BT have written into their residential contract that they can increase the price during the contract. This allows you to leave.

Which is the standard practice. I am not sure people here have read any contracts, as this clause would be in most contracts.

A lot of assumptions being made about Cerberus based on a few people's posts, one of the points about credit cards has been proven incorrect.

I can confirm NOTHING in the AUP or the contract has anything regarding a 750GB limit, so that's another post proven incorrect.

Now posters are saying they will increase the price. Can I ask, what is it these posters want? what are you trying to achieve? If your not happy with anything that's fine move on and don't bother posting. Why spend the time and effort to post negative inaccurate information? what are you going to get from doing that.

It's written into Cerberus's contract terms (version 3.1).

It's also available here - https://www.ofcom.org.uk/advice-for-businesses/contr...

O2 Czech Republic

In reply to a post by AndyHCZ:

O2 Czech Republic

lol

Business contracts can include price increase clauses within the contract. Those clauses may allow a specific maximum percentage within the contract and don't have to include a "get out of contract" free option. I haven't seen the Cerberus contract so don't know if they have such a clause but it is pretty common business practice in my experience.

exactly, O2 in Czech Republic... what is it your after AndyHCZ?

And next week it will be PlusNet FTTP connection.

Hope you checked their AUP and contract and terms.

Checked the contract again. Nothing about increasing, change rates etc... Nothing AT ALL. I would post the contract, but I don't think I am allowed to without permission.

In reply to a post by Snake:

Checked the contract again. Nothing about increasing, change rates etc... Nothing AT ALL. I would post the contract, but I don't think I am allowed to without permission.

If you leave out your personal details on the contract, leaving just their standard t&c's then its no big deal posting it on a public forum. I posted my BT Biz agreement online when they almost sold me the service for £150 pm as many people believed FTTPoD wasn't possible at such a low price (BT numpties cancelled the order in the end)

http://www.imageupload.co.uk/image/BVpK
http://www.imageupload.co.uk/image/BVp5
http://www.imageupload.co.uk/image/BVpZ
http://www.imageupload.co.uk/image/BVpc

I am going to pass on that. Simply because I would want to confirm with Cerberus first. I also don't see the point. People here are not helping or asking genuine questions, which btw they could call Cerberus and ask them selves.

I have created a new post for updates only, as I think this thread as gone off in a different direction.

No worries, hope it all goes well. Do let us know when Openreach have carried out the survey, that's a crucial stage as any issues (e.g. ECCs) affecting build times are flagged up then.

I think andy's isp doesnt have an AUP

Posting here, because your other thread is more for status updates:

In reply to a post by Snake:

considering if you really hammered a 330mb line you could download 200TB, so 4TB is less then 5% of possible total download.

My calcs get about 100TB for a month at 330Mb. Doesn't change your plans etc, but it does change your % usage. Maybe my sums are wrong?

your right,

I just used: http://www.thecloudcalculator.com/calculators/file-t...

100TB would take roughly 30days to transfer @330

4Tb would be 4% a month

Well at least 1TB equates to 1%. Easy to work out if you get full speed of 330 Meg.

The point was about the calculation, it was about my maximum usage ever of 4TB in a given month and what it would equate to on the new service and the possible concern of being contacting for abusing a service. At 4% I doubt anyone would call it abusive.

In reply to a post by Snake:

. I am not sure people here have read any contracts,

A lot of assumptions being made

Tell me about it - you assume none of us have ever read a contract. I read every one I get cover to cover before I sign.

Does that include all the Ts&Cs of software before you install them? If so then I'm thinking you don't use much software or you'd probably still be working your way through the first one

Great response.

I am sure will agree with all the contracts you have read most of them are pretty standard. What people here seem to be alluding to is Cerberus will screw me over where as another isp won't, this is all based upon wording in T&C's. When almost every isp will have similar agreements.

I agree with you Snake.

I have also order a FTToD line through Cerberus via my business.

So far they have been nothing but professional, friendly and appear to be very well organised. I'm not worried about their AUP as it's there to protect them legally from misuse and abuse.

One thing that is strange is that they never allowed me to pay on credit card. I paid on debit card to have some chargeback protection if they fail to deliver which I don't think they will.

I am now waiting for my survey. My biggest worry is actually now with Openreach and that they will find some excuse why they can't run the line to my house because of the conservation area I live in.

I'm in band E so my install costs are high.

I'll update you all along with Snake on my experience.

The reason I didn't go with FlluidOne who seem very professional too was purely based on price. I didn't see the justification for paying nearly double a month over 36 months and also then being forced to use an overly spec'ed router for my needs for an extra £800.

I want the cheapest option to get a fibre line installed so that I can then switch to normal FTTP and not get ripped off.

AS mentioned above I'm not concerned about being able to download TB's.

Edited by deleted (Fri 08-Sep-17 18:50:25)

In reply to a post by mumba:

I am now waiting for my survey. My biggest worry is actually now with Openreach and that they will find some excuse why they can't run the line to my house because of the conservation area I live in.

What sort of conservation area? AONB and Green Belt were not a problem where I live.

I don't blame them for not allowing you to pay by credit card. The difference in fees between a credit card and a debit card on such a bill can be considerable.

In reply to a post by mumba:

I am now waiting for my survey. My biggest worry is actually now with Openreach and that they will find some excuse why they can't run the line to my house because of the conservation area I live in.

I'm in band E so my install costs are high.

My fluidone order is in progress, and I am in a conservation area - band E. I hope we're not neighbours (CT4) or we could have done something a bit more clever!

Incidentally, BT Openreach did my survey yesterday - I wasn't there but they rang me. Everything is fine...

Edited by Jabes (Fri 08-Sep-17 21:59:07)

How soon after placing the order does the survey take place?

BT Wholesale has a number of advantages over its competitors. I chose TalkTalk Wholesale for my AAISP line, thinking it would be more reliable. Nope, no chance! It's had variable pings - when my line resyncs it chooses either a ~13ms or ~19ms ping path. It's had relatively speaking significant downtime. And peak time congestion issues, which they took ages to fix.

The reason for TalkTalk's issues is mostly because they have a cobbled-together network from a circular core dark-fibre route, connected to exchanges by leased 1/10Gbit/s lines. Essentially, they don't really own any of the network themselves and don't have the means of optimising it.

By comparison, BT's network has been around much longer and has been carefully designed. It's also owned and operated almost entirely by them, so they have full control and can optimise it. When I was on BT, I never saw peak congestion, excessive downtime or varying pings (max ever was 11ms).

When we add on the fact that BT Wholesale covers every single exchange in the UK (except KCOM of course), it's got some strong advantages. So while £48 per Mbit/s per month is in no way a true reflection of their costs, taking your costs and adding a given margin on top isn't the only pricing method. When you have significant advantages over your nearest competitors, you can afford to keep artificially high (demand led) pricing.

AAISP's 1/2/10TB tariffs have only been made possible due to special arrangements and rates with TalkTalk, which I imagine would be charging them significantly less than £48 per Mbit/s per month.

Their recent discussions of usage implied that the price of the 1TB tariff didn't really cover the cost of 1TB of usage + Openreach WLR/GEA rental, so my calculations suggest perhaps TT is charging in the region of £20 per Mbit/s per month.

Edited by deleted (Sat 09-Sep-17 07:58:23)

In reply to a post by Bill100:

How soon after placing the order does the survey take place?

Mine was done ~ 3 weeks after placing the order.

In reply to a post by Bill100:

How soon after placing the order does the survey take place?

FTTPoD Timeline (so far)

10th August - Order accepted
7th September - Openreach External Survey
...

Understand what you're saying but have a look at Adrian's speech from 7 min 35 sec. Ok this goes back a couple of years so things may be different now but he's basically saying BTW aren't (or weren't) very quick at fixing congestion issues.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6OHDA47T_8g

This is back from 2015 though. I think things have changed somewhat since then, especially as BT Wholesale have significantly increased their investment in their backhaul network to cope with the growing demand.

I think one of the biggest issues for AAISP was the procedure of raising congestion. The first support call was to an Indian call centre, where the people dealing with the incidents had next to no experience in network analysis and treated things as individual line issues.

I agree BTw's network is very likely much more resilient in its redundancy with its mesh design.

However just to point out when I was on BT infinity my packets seemed to be flip flopping between 2 different routes so I had permanent on going jitter, luckily the latency difference wasnt huge but it was there, also the routing is not always optimal, this of course depends where you live but in my case if I use BTw my packets first go north to Peterborough or Birmingham and then south to london whilst sky have a POP in my city so I go direct to london.

Plusnet (and other BTw customers) had congestion issues a year or two back related to the shared MSIL's on BTw getting congested, these shared MSIL's are supposed to be managed by BTw but were allowed to get congested, it got fixed by plusnet moving its customers to dedicated MSIL's and those shared MSIL's are no longer congested.

How much did u pay for Band E inc VAT?

couple of thoughts on the adrian aaisp video.

at 20mins interesting comments on the sin349 rubbish.

He also mentions earlier in the video about a ethernet FTTC type wholesale service from TT which he says is very well priced, I wonder if thats what they using for their wholesale TT now, because if BTw and TTB were very similar priced he would be able to offer the same packages on both but the 1TB package is TTB only.

Jabes, I'm in North West London.

For those asking Band E is expensive. Cerberus add a premium to the Openreach price. My estimated install cost is £4200 ex VAT for band E. That's about £350 more than the Openreach price charged to them.

This maybe a silly question but do you not have to be around for the Survey to show BT exactly where you want the fibre to enter your house?

I'm worried I will have to dig a trench in my drive way to get the cable to the side of my house where I want the fibre to enter.

I was told my survey would be approximately 2 weeks after placing my order but I am expecting it to be 3 or 4 weeks. I guess it depends on availability of engineers in the area.

In reply to a post by mumba:

For those asking Band E is expensive. Cerberus add a premium to the Openreach price. My estimated install cost is £4200 ex VAT for band E. That's about £350 more than the Openreach price charged to them.

Chances are that "premium" partially covers the significant BT Wholesale bandwidth charges. I was charged £3700 (ex vat) for a band D installation by Fluidone, yet Openreach charge £3200 for a band d install, which includes the £750 connection fee.

Edited by deleted (Sat 09-Sep-17 20:48:19)

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

couple of thoughts on the adrian aaisp video.

at 20mins interesting comments on the sin349 rubbish.

He also mentions earlier in the video about a ethernet FTTC type wholesale service from TT which he says is very well priced, I wonder if thats what they using for their wholesale TT now, because if BTw and TTB were very similar priced he would be able to offer the same packages on both but the 1TB package is TTB only.

AA no longer do EoFTTC it was £150 a month + about £500 install but it was unlimited

Have Cerberus been keeping you up-to-date with the order progress? How has their communication been so far?

Hi Bill,

Yes Cerberus has been in touch, however I was out of the country (Honduras) and so they called and left voice messages and followed up via email. Currently still waiting on Openreach to provide a survey date, they seem to be busy but should have a date soon.

Thank you!

I can add to this. Cerberus have been excellent at keeping me informed of my order's progress.

Cerberus are still waiting for BT to schedule a survey date. It's been nearly 2 weeks since my order was placed so I am not worried yet as most people have said 3 to 4 weeks is normal.

Could be month or could be year to wait!

I�m hoping to take the plunge into getting Cerberus FTTPoD and have a question,

Does anyone know if I�ll lose my current PSTN line when this service is installed?

I have a phone number I�d had for nearly 30 years and don�t want to lose it. I�ve heard reports on people losing their number when going with FTTP.

Got quoted band C by the way (£2750).

You shouldn�t lose your number the pstn will stay in place the fttpod will just be for the internet.

In reply to a post by gigaplant:

Does anyone know if I�ll lose my current PSTN line when this service is installed?

As someone who has had the service installed I can confirm your copper line will remain as it is and you will not lose your existing number. FTTPoD is treated as a totally separate installation and will be data only for the first 3 years at least.

Edited by deleted (Thu 05-Oct-17 21:12:36)