Gigaclear Latency and Buffering at peak times (8pm to 10pm)

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

The good news is that after providing lots of evidence, thanks mainly to the BQM, and also just some simple ping results at various times and nPerf speed tests, Gigaclear have confirmed that they have congestion at those peak times after an increase in customers in the area over the last few months.

This was the BQM for yesterday: My Broadband Ping

Apparently they are in the process of increasing the capacity and so this should be resolved. I accept that these capacity increases are revenue dependant for a commercial organisation, it would have just been better had they been open from the start.

I will keep watching the BQM and hopefully this will improve over the next few months.

Thanks again for all the replies.

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

Thank you for the replies. I'm not sure I can persuade Gigaclear to put some content distribution system in place especially as they are saying the issue is mine.

During the increased latency (the graph I included in my post) we were watching Dope Thief on AppleTV and the pixelation and even occasional buffering was really bad. This is something we have experienced during other AppleTV shows and other streaming services.

We tend to watch Netflix at weekends so I haven't noticed it on that service, it is more services that release episodes weekly (so AppleTV, Paramount+ and Disney+) where we generally sit down of an evening around 8pm onwards to watch them.

We haven't noticed it with Paramount+ since that subscription is linked to our Sky subscription so Paramount+ only streams in HD quality and not 4K.

I have used fast.com and also the speed test on the Gigaclear website (Speedtest) and as I said using the Netgear speed test on the routers admin pages (also Speedtest).

Screen Captures

Hopefully you can view the images in that folder, one is another monitor graph and the other is a speed test taken on the router while we were experiencing pixelation and buffering from AppleTV.

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

Hello and thank you for sharing that information, it is really interesting and explains a lot. We currently get Paramount+ through Sky Q so it is only HD quality (with ads) for now but that will change when we leave Sky later in the year (switching to Now TV as it integrates better with AppleTV).

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

My Broadband Ping

That is our graph from last night and even Netflix pixelated (so bad it was like watching PAL upscaled to UHD) while watching a Broken Mirror episode. I really wish I'd grabbed my phone to take a picture it was so bad.

Edited by JamesMcBride (Thu 08-May-25 19:55:02)

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

Thank you to everyone contributing to this topic. Tuesday here too, looks like this day of the week is also a problem for people in different parts of the country. To quote Gibbs from NCIS: Rule 39 states, “There’s no such thing as a coincidence.”

Could this indicate that it is a more central issue, perhaps with GCs core network/bandwidth? Would all of the areas where GC have deployed fibre converge to a central point or would there be regional connectivity. I don't have any real knowledge in this area but I do know that every ISP has to connect back to the main backbone of the internet somewhere.

In reply to a post by Bryer:

Yeah the problem seems to be in the North Essex area, seeing huge issue in the Kelvedon/Feering nodes at the moment from both ends of the village. Our backbone heads up to Coggeshall, where there are also contention issues at the moment.

Edited by KryptonKid (Fri 09-May-25 16:28:37)

In reply to a post by KryptonKid:

It seems to be spreading. I'm in Northamptonshire and this was yesterday.

In reply to a post by twofacedtrout1:

I'm also based in Tiptree and recently had a visit from a Gigaclear fibre engineer who was really helpful. He confirmed that the fibre connection from the cabinet to the kerb, from the kerb to the outside of the house, and from the outside to inside the house were all working perfectly.

Although no major faults have been 'reported' in the area, I showed him this thread along with our latency monitoring data, and he could clearly see there’s an issue.

He then called one of the senior infrastructure engineers on loudspeaker—who was also very helpful. They confirmed there’s no planned maintenance during the affected times, but suggested the issue may be due to a bandwidth bottleneck. Apparently, funding has already been allocated for bandwidth upgrades in the Witham area, which our traffic routes through.

His report will be available for Gigaclear to see by the end of the day. He said to keep pushing at them to get it sorted and it should speed up the process. Also passed comment that the upgrades happen as more and more houses get connected onto their network.

Hope this helps.

Edited by KryptonKid (Tue 13-May-25 10:03:05)

This was the first Case Number: 02403679
This is the most recent and has the most detail Case Number: 02452381

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

Here are the two case numbers:

This was the first Case Number: 02403679
This is the most recent and has the most detail Case Number: 02452381

I have been quite lucky with renewals and dealing with the retention teams. I usually quote the disparity between the cost per Mbps between existing and new customers, then question why existing loyal customers are penalised so much, especially when they have a monopoly. Has worked so far to keep the cost down but does mean committing to another 18 month contract.

Edited by KryptonKid (Tue 13-May-25 11:04:37)

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

I'll be paying close attention to the graph tonight, Tuesday evening is usually the worst, so will show if they have made any improvements.

In reply to a post by KryptonKid:

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

I'll be paying close attention to the graph tonight, Tuesday evening is usually the worst, so will show if they have made any improvements.

How did you fare last night?

I didn't have the same 'blip' as last week, it was reasonably 'normal'.

My Broadband Ping

Paul

Edited by KryptonKid (Thu 15-May-25 16:18:46)

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

Looks like the new website has broken all the monitor links

We are currently importing historic speed test results to our new website which should become available over the coming days. Apologies for any inconvenience.

Speed tests are not currently showing on the profiles, but rest assured this will be fixed in the coming days and all your historical data will be there too. We had an issue during the import we didn’t come across in testing but we have a solution planned.

Edited by pluralist (Mon 19-May-25 19:24:34)

In reply to a post by RR_The_IT_Guy:

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

Looks like the new website has broken all the monitor links

Tell me about it, time to create my signature again

Edited by Chrysalis (Thu 22-May-25 17:51:29)

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

That is how ours used to look before the 9th May. Sorry they have not resolved the issue for your area yet.

Hope you don't have too much longer to wait.

In reply to a post by Sah1:

Mine is awful ping 88 and 13mb download. Gigaclear is [censored] when there is issues as they blame everything else but themselves.

In reply to a post by Bryer:

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

That is how ours used to look before the 9th May. Sorry they have not resolved the issue for your area yet.

Hope you don't have too much longer to wait.

It's got really bad this weekend. Are you still seeing issues?

My Broadband Ping

In reply to a post by geo71966:

In reply to a post by Bryer:

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

That is how ours used to look before the 9th May. Sorry they have not resolved the issue for your area yet.

Hope you don't have too much longer to wait.

It's got really bad this weekend. Are you still seeing issues?

My Broadband Ping

Adding mine here too from today (Feering), I've also raised a further complaint through executive branch and awaiting a response with a plethora of evidence to try and get things sped up.

I've been effected in someway or another with contention issues since early April, this is awful.

My Broadband Ping

In reply to a post by Bryer:

In reply to a post by geo71966:

In reply to a post by Bryer:

... nested quotes trimmed ...

It's got really bad this weekend. Are you still seeing issues?

My Broadband Ping

Adding mine here too from today (Feering), I've also raised a further complaint through executive branch and awaiting a response with a plethora of evidence to try and get things sped up.

I've been effected in someway or another with contention issues since early April, this is awful.

My Broadband Ping

Which end of Feering are you? Are you nearer the River Blackwater or nearer the Bloor homes estate? Each end of Feering connects to a different back bone. With the One Stop end of the village going to the cabinet at the end of Kelvedon by the A12, with the Bloor Homes end going to Coggeshall.

In reply to a post by geo71966:

In reply to a post by Bryer:

In reply to a post by geo71966:

... nested quotes trimmed ...

Adding mine here too from today (Feering), I've also raised a further complaint through executive branch and awaiting a response with a plethora of evidence to try and get things sped up.

I've been effected in someway or another with contention issues since early April, this is awful.

My Broadband Ping

Which end of Feering are you? Are you nearer the River Blackwater or nearer the Bloor homes estate? Each end of Feering connects to a different back bone. With the One Stop end of the village going to the cabinet at the end of Kelvedon by the A12, with the Bloor Homes end going to Coggeshall.

I'm on Sherwood Way, so assume that means I'm going through the cabinet on the off ramp.

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

It's a bit hit and miss from Sherwood Way, Gigaclear never confirmed what way the routing went. Considering how quickly it went live after they dug the fibres in would lead me to belive that it routes to Coggeshall.

In reply to a post by geo71966:

In reply to a post by Bryer:

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

That is how ours used to look before the 9th May. Sorry they have not resolved the issue for your area yet.

Hope you don't have too much longer to wait.

It's got really bad this weekend. Are you still seeing issues?

My Broadband Ping

Adding mine here too from today (Feering), I've also raised a further complaint through executive branch and awaiting a response with a plethora of evidence to try and get things sped up.

I've been effected in someway or another with contention issues since early April, this is awful.

My Broadband Ping

In reply to a post by twofacedtrout1:

Good morning everyone,

I’m currently in contact with Gigaclear, and they believe the cabinet upgrade was completed last night. From my monitoring, I experienced a two-hour connection outage, which could indicate progress toward finally resolving the issue. They still plan to come out and replace my ONT, though I’m unsure why, as they have already identified the cabinet as the faulty component. Regardless, I remain hopeful for improved service in the coming evenings.

Edited by KryptonKid (Tue 27-May-25 17:12:51)

In reply to a post by twofacedtrout1:

While on the phone with Gigaclear, the engineer who inspected the fibre gave me an update.

He mentioned that a meeting has been scheduled for Monday to discuss the upgrade. Although he couldn’t confirm a timeframe for any follow-up work, he said he’ll call me if he hears anything further from that meeting — so fingers crossed for some progress!

I also shared this thread with Gigaclear support during the call, and they’ve escalated it directly to their manager. Hopefully, this helps highlight the issue and moves things along.

And if anyone from Gigaclear management happens to see this — your customer service has been excellent, so thank you!

In reply to a post by ian72:

If you have a total loss of service then after 48 hours gigaclear would automatically start to compensate you based on the Ofcom compensation recommendations. However, I don't think you have a total loss of service. Also, if you service is suspended for more than 28 days due to a technical issue then you can terminate the contract - this doesn't apply either.

In reply to a post by ian72:

Contractually you have no right to compensation or terminate based on this current performance. You would need to probably put complaints to them and if they cannot resolve it and don't agree to let you go then you would have to go to the ombudsman.

In reply to a post by ian72:

If you were to withhold payment then they do have contractual terms to charge you interest and potentially other charges on the withheld payment.
The are consumer contracts essentially without an SLA - they aren't business contracts at business prices that give you the level of SLA that would result in compensation for poor performance. You likely you need to spend a lot of time fighting and if you were to stop payments then that could massively back fire on your credit rating so only do anything if you understand the potential consequences.

In reply to a post by ian72:

If you have a total loss of service then after 48 hours gigaclear would automatically start to compensate you based on the Ofcom compensation recommendations. However, I don't think you have a total loss of service. Also, if you service is suspended for more than 28 days due to a technical issue then you can terminate the contract - this doesn't apply either.

Contractually you have no right to compensation or terminate based on this current performance. You would need to probably put complaints to them and if they cannot resolve it and don't agree to let you go then you would have to go to the ombudsman. If you were to withhold payment then they do have contractual terms to charge you interest and potentially other charges on the withheld payment.

The are consumer contracts essentially without an SLA - they aren't business contracts at business prices that give you the level of SLA that would result in compensation for poor performance. You likely you need to spend a lot of time fighting and if you were to stop payments then that could massively back fire on your credit rating so only do anything if you understand the potential consequences.

In reply to a post by jpm:

That explanation smells a bit,

In reply to a post by Sah1:

told me it’s 1-3 weeks to install the upgrade.

Thank you for your detailed message and for providing comprehensive information regarding the issues you've been experiencing. I want to start by sincerely apologising for the inconvenience and frustration this has caused you.

We are very sorry that your recent experience has not met the standards you rightfully expect from Gigaclear. It’s clear from the evidence and troubleshooting steps you’ve shared — including BQM monitoring, speed tests, and hardware diagnostics — that you’ve gone to great lengths to isolate the issue. Your observations around peak-time latency and packet loss,

Also, in regards to your service issue, I am more than happy to raise this with our technical department to look in further, I can see that this has been raised in the past, So with this I can raise this to the head of the tech department

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

More generally PON congestion (at least up till now) has been very rarely observed in FTTP networks. This is mainly due to the lower take up %’s as these networks are relatively young, lower on average connection tiers (not everyone is on gigabit+ subs) and finally statistical contention.

Congestion could be in several places. It’s unlikely to be the PON especially if this is affecting people far a wide, rather than in a local street / neighbourhood covered by the same PON. More likely it’s deeper in their network.

Edited by Bryer (Thu 29-May-25 16:58:44)

In reply to a post by Bryer:

Don't want to tempt fate, but they've clearly done something today as I'm seeing flat lines on my BQM.

I wanted to let you know that the performance problems you’ve been experiencing are part of a wider congestion issue affecting your area. Our network teams are fully aware and are currently working on a long-term solution to resolve this.

An upgrade is planned to increase capacity in the area, but this process does require obtaining the necessary permissions and coordinating with third parties, which can take some time. Rest assured, this work is being prioritised, and we’ll move forward with the upgrade as soon as everything is in place.

We really appreciate your understanding and will keep you updated as we receive more information on progress and timeframes.

In reply to a post by Bryer:

Don't want to tempt fate, but they've clearly done something today as I'm seeing flat lines on my BQM.

In reply to a post by twofacedtrout1:

In reply to a post by Bryer:

Don't want to tempt fate, but they've clearly done something today as I'm seeing flat lines on my BQM.

Mine was fairly flat also but this might just be people going out and enjoying the weather??

Edited by KryptonKid (Mon 02-Jun-25 14:48:29)

In reply to a post by twofacedtrout1:

Had Gigaclear on the phone again today looking at the issue. Seem to think that no one else has reported this and it's my equipment again?

Had me plug in the Linksys router so they could test even though the issue doesn't happen until after 6pm?

So many mixed messages... really is hard work. Wish they would just be honest, feel like they are trying to run me in circles.

Edited by DatabaseJase (Thu 05-Jun-25 07:39:58)

In reply to a post by KryptonKid:

Looks like they were true to their word and did indeed fix the issue for Northamptonshire. My response was essentially ruler flat yesterday evening.

5th June

Paul

In reply to a post by Bryer:

In reply to a post by KryptonKid:

Looks like they were true to their word and did indeed fix the issue for Northamptonshire. My response was essentially ruler flat yesterday evening.

5th June

Paul

How you getting on tonight? We've seen a few days maybe a week of flat lines, however tonight the latency, packet loss and speed drops are back with a bang!

08/06/2025

In reply to a post by KryptonKid:

Mine has actually improved as the week has gone on, with the odd blips that I'd put down to normal usage here.

Edited by DatabaseJase (Wed 11-Jun-25 08:08:48)

In reply to a post by geo71966:

In reply to a post by Bryer:

In reply to a post by KryptonKid:

Looks like they were true to their word and did indeed fix the issue for Northamptonshire. My response was essentially ruler flat yesterday evening.

5th June

Paul

How you getting on tonight? We've seen a few days maybe a week of flat lines, however tonight the latency, packet loss and speed drops are back with a bang!

08/06/2025

Your line looks a lot more noisy than it should be. We have similar spikes for congestion as we are in the same area, but outside of congestion periods mine is pretty flat.

My Broadband Ping

In reply to a post by KryptonKid:

Are you provisioned via a fixed IP address? Or CGNAT?

Edited by DatabaseJase (Wed 11-Jun-25 15:30:03)

To address the congestion, a new backhaul is being provisioned for your area. The estimated timeline for this work to be completed is July.

In reply to a post by geo71966:

Just a small update from me on this.

Had a planned outage email from Gigaclear for 24th 23:00 to 25th 06:00 which is longer than I've seen before. Thought it may have something to do with it but perhaps not.

Recent response from Gigaclear directly on the issue:

To address the congestion, a new backhaul is being provisioned for your area. The estimated timeline for this work to be completed is July.

Pretty large estimate on the timeframe... But there you go.

In reply to a post by Bryer:

In reply to a post by geo71966:

Just a small update from me on this.

Had a planned outage email from Gigaclear for 24th 23:00 to 25th 06:00 which is longer than I've seen before. Thought it may have something to do with it but perhaps not.

Recent response from Gigaclear directly on the issue:

To address the congestion, a new backhaul is being provisioned for your area. The estimated timeline for this work to be completed is July.

Pretty large estimate on the timeframe... But there you go.

Hoping it will go some way to helping the issue, tonight's been a cluster fudge!
My Broadband Ping

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

In reply to a post by KryptonKid:

Are you provisioned via a fixed IP address? Or CGNAT?

I have added a fixed IP address to my GC subscription, it makes it easier for working at home plus it is something I started doing a long time ago when I was with Zen (when I ran my own SMTP, DNS, etc. servers so the fixed IP address was a necessity).

Nostalgia now takes me back to Demon Internet days where it all started when you had to run your own SMTP server as they did not support POP3 but of course I'm talking 56K modem days... queue shimmering nostalgic vision of days gone by...

Yes I can actually type and send an email over an SMTP port 25 telnet connection

In reply to a post by JamesMcBride:

Started even earlier this afternoon
My Broadband Ping

In reply to a post by geo71966:

Yeah echoing the issues from the last 2 days. I can't even load compressed website images right now. 900/900 and I'm getting pixelated 2mb pngs.

I've pushed the point and escalated again, at the very least, they need public acknowledgement of impacted service in this area, with proper timelines to resolution.

Its fair to say infrastructure improvements take time, but that doesn't change the fact everyones here experience has been impacted, let alone it shouldn't get THIS BAD before its acknowledged

In reply to a post by chappers2025:

Spoke with Gigaclear yesterday who did the usual basic checks. I was told "no faults on the line".

In reply to a post by twofacedtrout1:

Hi all,

Been a little quiet recently with life stuff going on. In the meantime I have been communicating with Senior Support and NOC teams at gigaclear regularly.

Everyone should of received the email about the change that happened last night? They confirmed that there was an issue and they are putting in a temporary fix before the upgrade that is happening in July (No specific date has been confirmed yet) which will resolve all of these issues.

I had previously completed some testing and changing the port on the ONT (GC need to change this) and my router to 1000full helped address some of the packet loss that was happening as my home network is 2.5gb - but the last week has crazy bad, I went out and bought a 4g dongle just so I could get some kind of internet to the property.

I will keep you all posted as much as I can. If you have case numbers and want to send them across to me, I can speak with Lewis at GC to potentially pick them up and bunch all of this together so no information gets lost.

Hope this helps

Edited by geo71966 (Tue 24-Jun-25 21:44:36)

In reply to a post by geo71966:

I had a service outage notification but that is for tonight going into tomorrow. And yes over the last 8 days it has been unusable after 4pm until midnight, I've just been using my phone hotspot. Super loved getting my invoice through this morning, really class.

I'm similarly at the same stage as yourself with support. Everyone acknowledges they can't simply resolve our issue until the infrastructure install is completed.

But if you want to give them a web of information my case is with Executive Office under Belle, case 02528799

Edit: I just did a wired speedtest and got 8.8mbps DL......

In reply to a post by twofacedtrout1:

I didn't see any disconnects like I thought I would.

I have asked, but no one has come back to me yet.

In reply to a post by twofacedtrout1:

How was everyone's broadband last night? Couldn't believe how good mine was.

Is this what broadband should be lol

Please be advised that scheduled maintenance will take place between 23:00 and 06:00, during the period of 18.08.2025 to 19.08.2025.

This maintenance may cause a brief service interruption of no longer than 10 minutes.

In reply to a post by DatabaseJase:

Just through I'd check in and see how everyone was getting on, is the issue resolved for those reporting issues now?

I'm pleased to say no issues since it was resolved in our area, back to normal. We have given notice on Sky Q so all our UHD/4K TV will be through the Apple TV box using Now TV, Apple TV+, Disney+, Paramount+ and Amazon Prime plus the usual iPlayer, ITVx, CH4, CH5, etc.

iPlayer finally supports subtitles on Apple TV so that is a big deal and just in time for our switch away from Sky Q.

Also noticed this that seemed to be a global maintenance (we had a brief outage around 2am for about 10 minutes):

Please be advised that scheduled maintenance will take place between 23:00 and 06:00, during the period of 18.08.2025 to 19.08.2025.

This maintenance may cause a brief service interruption of no longer than 10 minutes.

We have had another notification of maintenance on the evening of the 20th August.

In reply to a post by Bryer:

Issues seem to be resolved here, however a massive latency issue still persists from the Fire TV sticks and the Fire cube I have installed here when selecting content from Amazon, so guessing it's a routing or CDN issue at Amazon's end. Just had a email notifying of an overnight system outage planned for the 26th to 27th August.