Have Orange de-LLU'd my exchange or not?

Hi

I'm currenty synced at 8128/832 on a BT ipstream service (Entanet L2TP) but as i live very close to my exchange would love to get Orange's "up to 20 meg service", however 2 months ago they took off LLU so i gave up hope of ever getting >8meg (no other LLU at my exchange) however i have now checked my exchange on SamKnows and Orange LLU has re-appeared! So with my mouth salivating, i went to Orange's website and after entering my phone number it says i can only get 6 meg which suggests that Orange website rightly/wrongly thinks that i do not have LLU at my exchange. Anyone else experiencing this? Yes i know i could call up Orange to ask but their monkeys will only repeat what it says on their website ie i have to pay £17 pm (LLU select is £12 pm).

My exchange is Inverness Culloden
http://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange/NSICL

Cheers

Edited by deleted (Wed 25-Nov-09 19:20:34)

Orange website checker consistently underestimates speeds!

It predicts only 9.5 Meg on my line that has run at 16 meg LLU.

The Orange checker gives 4.5 meg for my second line. It's currently sync'd to Virgin LLU at over 11 meg but that discrepancy is down to BT's database, not Orange.

Orange should have a better idea of which exchanges they unbundled but I am confused. SamKnows has gone back to showing my exchange was LLU'd in May 2008 but my free broadband is still provided using BT IPstream. The member centre estimates my speed as 6 Meg or 7 Meg (depending which page I look at) which is consistent with the speed my Livebox is sync'd at.

My available upgrade packages are all up to 8 Meg only and the prices look different to the ones on the website for pay monthly mobile customers eg. Home Select £12, Home Max £9.50 plus £10.50 line rental.

So could I get Orange LLU or not???

Answer is simple, if Orange when you contact them say no to LLU, then what is in the exchange hardly matters, either you are missing out through their mistake, or it is really not there, no amount of arguing is probably going to get it for you.

SamKnows has had variations before, all depends on how exactly they are getting the data, it may be someone on that site has simply imported the wrong spreadsheet, or assumed a planned date has actually occurred. LLU roll-out plans probably change from week to week.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

Answer is simple, if Orange when you contact them say no to LLU, then what is in the exchange hardly matters, either you are missing out through their mistake, or it is really not there, no amount of arguing is probably going to get it for you.

I don't think it's that simple although it should be. When I signed up (over the phone, end of July) Orange said "yes you're exchange is LLU" (I wouldn't have signed up if it wasn't), I'm being billed for LLU, yet I'm on IPStream and can run BT speed tests. When they launched 20mbps, I rang up again, they said, "yes you're on LLU, 20mbps is available on your exchange, we'll upgrade you". So far they haven't, I'm still on IPStream, I rang up queried, they said "something must have gone wrong with the upgrade, you should have never been on IPStream in the first place, I'll put the upgrade through again". Still no luck, still IPStream. And my exchange is one of the ones that on SamKnows went from LLU>>>no LLU>>>LLU.

I have a funny feeling the list given to SamKnows and the one Orange are working off includes exchanges they intended at some point unbundle but for some reason haven't yet. I've spoken to a couple of other people locally on the same exchange who are are also supposedly on Orange LLU but turns out they're not. The availability checker on their site also reckons my exchange is "within an Orange network area" and offers the LLU prices to me.

My exchange is http://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange/LCULV not many choices and Orange LLU at £4.18 a month seeing as I already had a mobile contract and needed to save some money when I moved house and knew they were about to launch 20mbps services, appeared to be a decent enough offer at the time despite the general bad rep of Orange BB.

Edited by deleted (Mon 30-Nov-09 18:29:29)

Andrew is right, the answer for practical purposes is no you can't get LLU because you signed up and didn't get it!

They may or may not have unbundled my exchange, the reality is that my free broadband is still on IPstream and they only offer me 8 Meg upgrade packages.

If Orange want to offer IPstream connections at LLU prices in some areas that's up to them, although it's bad luck if you signed up with the faster LLU service in mind. It would be a different matter if they had promised a faster speed than 8 Meg before signing up and then failed to deliver.

Your situation is different from the other posters here. They were refused LLU when they tried to sign up with Orange. In your case, you were told you would be on LLU when you signed up and their Website confirmed you were within their network area.

Therefore Orange have breached their contract by putting you on IPStream regardless of the price they are charging you. They should either put you on LLU, as they promised on the 'phone, or allow you to withdraw without penalty.

As a matter of interest, what speed does Orange's availability checker offer you?

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

As a matter of interest, what speed does Orange's availability checker offer you?

When I signed up it said 4mbps, now if I put in next doors number is says 7mbps. I currently get a full sync with a 7150kbps IP profile.

Oh, and I explicitly asked them three times when I signed up if I would be on LLU. It was the first thing I asked them, I confirmed it when they quoted the price, and I triple checked when they asked "is there anything else I can help you with". Also when I tried to upgrade to 20mbps, again they stated that my exchange was LLU'd.

Edited by deleted (Wed 02-Dec-09 18:28:06)

I've just got an email from the executive office at Orange about this:

Thank you for your email regarding your connection to IPStream, rather than
our LLU service.

After consulting our engineers, at the point of registration it would appear
that our LLU capacity in your exchange was full, therefore you were connected
to the IPStream service. A situation may arise in the near future where we
will be able to migrate your service to LLU and I have asked the engineers to
check this possibility. As soon as I receive feedback I will contact you to
advise.