IDNet 1GBPS FTTP - Periods of high ping all of a sudden

I've had an IDNet FTTP line running (routed by a UniFi UDM-SE), which has been running absolutely fine up until about 2 days ago, when I've been seeing massive pings for periods of the day. We barely use the line bandwidth wise, if I look at the logs in UniFi, we barely break 20mbps most of the time.

A normal day looks like this:
T-2

-> Absolutely great.

In the last couple of days, we've noticed big latency spikes, and the following:
Today

Yesterday


I've got a smokeping running to various targets, including the nexthop access concentrator at IDNet, which show much the same thing.

Running through diagnostics with IDNet at the moment, who are looking around issues with my routing. All seems absolutely fine otherwise on the routing front (I get a clean speedtest of 920/105, and an A+ on the bufferbloat test, so no lack of grunt on the routing). Is this likely to be a BT PON issue, or an IDNet issue, and how am I best placed to get them to track it down?

I'm almost certain this isn't driven by usage internally - If I take the hour around the period of high latency around 2pm on 21/09, I'm seeing a *max* utilisation of 4mbps down and 1mbps up for the network. Nothings ever really saturated the line to the level that its had any noticeable effect on pings.

Edited by bdav (Thu 21-Sep-23 19:21:16)

Same deal again today unfortunately. It appears to be extremely peak time dependent.

AIUI, the GPON itself is meant to be pretty resilient on the latency front - is this likely to be over contention at the IDNet end? I'm told they don't have any way to investigate this (??)

My Broadband Ping

Ask them who their backhaul provider is between your headend exchange and their network

Hmmm

I know I should not jump to conclusions but lets guess at Zen backhaul...

https://forums.thinkbroadband.com/zen/t/4741674-re-n...
https://forum.kitz.co.uk/index.php/topic,27680.0.html

I am indeed on a Zen backhaul they've confirmed.

Do they have a choice / can I get them to switch this out? I was with Aquiss before and never had any contention issues whatsoever, and indeed for most of the time i've had the IDNet connection its been fine.

Edited by bdav (Fri 22-Sep-23 16:12:13)

I would say with almost 100% certainty the issue is with IDNet and/or their backhaul provider, of which they use Zen Wholesale last I heard. Zen Wholesale provision where they can over their own network, if there is no Zen network in your area, Zen will provision over BT Wholesale, but could move you at a later date if their network arrives in your locality.

As alluded to by others, there have been lots of reports of problems with Zen's connectivity, often suddenly starting and coinciding with them having been shifted over to Zen's own backhaul.

It is very unlikely to be a local issue, such as your GPON or kit.

I left IDNet because they used Zen Wholesale and I was on Zens network from my area, and had various issues which IDNet just said I had to accept, so I voted with my feet.

At one time IDNet did allow you to swap to BT Wholesale backhaul, but this stopped being an option some years ago, at around the same time Zen's own customers could no0 longer choose to swap backhaul supplier. Seems Zen Wholesale and Zen decided if their network was an option, they weren't paying extra to run by request over BT Wholesale.

I asked IDNet about swapping to BT Wholesale and got a very definite NO not happening, by all means ask, nothing to lose.

Edited by E300 (Fri 22-Sep-23 16:24:19)

Was that an in-contract termination? I've only been with them for just under a month. I think I'd rather be back with Aquiss than argue the toss!

I've asked about the swap to BTW. Will see what they have to say. I suspect I may be moving onto an in contract termination battle...

Edited by bdav (Fri 22-Sep-23 16:26:56)

It was at the end of the contract I left IDNet. Ironically I did leave Aquiss mid-contract because of congestion problems that couldn't be resolved, all fixed by moving to AA, can't fault them, they might cost more but it was worth it to be free of problems as I use my connection for work.

If your problems are not fixed in a certain period of time you can leave your contract early with an ISP, not sure of the rules or trigger points.

Hopefully it will be something they can fix.

Did they migrate you around the time it stopped working? You still have rights as a consumer, ask them politely to either resolve this in a reasonable about of time (say, a week, that seems fair to me) or they can release you from your contract.