From PAYG 6Gb to Broadband Your Way 8Gb

Hi all

Just wondering if there are any disadvantages I have overlooked in moving from a Plusnet PAYG 6Gb where I currently pay

For one thing you'll move from a very lightly traffic managed account to a heavily managed one. Example speeds for various types of usage are shown on the following page:

http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/products/broadband_your_way/experience/speed.shtml#Option2speeds

Edited by deleted (Wed 25-Apr-07 22:46:31)

In addition to Neken's gotcha about being managed another one is that you will now be subject to the cessation charge from BT if you move house or decide to switch to a cable operator, for example.

Since BT Wholesale has introduced the charge, I suspect anyone who ceases will be liable to that charge, not just those who change contract.

Charges from BT are passed on, generally, or absorbed where an ISP sees it is in their interest to gain a customer. Clearly, when a charge is for a cease of service it is not in the interest of the ISP to pay it.

Seems to me that in the greater scheme of things, the cost of a cease is peanuts when moving house, and as for switching to cable, that's an option for around 50% of the populace (odds are they are in densely populated areas, feel sorry for them!) and another thing which is pretty unrelated to switching to this account type... would be the same for anyone using a BT line and any ISP but switching, as from 01/05/07

>Since BT Wholesale has introduced the charge, I suspect anyone who ceases will be liable to that charge, not just those who change contract.

If it's not in the contract can't see how they can pass on the charge.
And if an ISP claims it's simply passing on the charge, then everyone on the old contracts could claim a price reduction when BT Wholesale lower their price.

From http://www.plus.net/support/customer_service/billing/cessation_charges.shtml:

Cessation charges only apply to Broadband Your Way customers on these Terms and Conditions as of 1st May 2007. If you are a Broadband PAYG Basic, Broadband PAYG, Broadband Plus or Broadband Premier customer you do not need to pay any cessation charges at this stage. However, this may change in the future.

Look at the excellent comparison on Kitz's site.

http://www.kitz.co.uk/adsl/plusnet_shaping2.htm

The disadvantage on all the BBYW products is shaping and restrictions on some downloads such as P2P. I changed to BBYW Op2 but wish I hadn't done as I was unaware of the restrictions. These are still not easily found on PlusNet's information regarding BBYW. Also fax2email not available on BBYW but you should be able to take your fax number with you if you already have one. So if you need a fax2email, set this up first and then migrate to BBYW.

We will be happy to move you back to your original product if you like - Simply raise a ticket with support if you would like us to do this.

If you have suggestions for how we can make this clearer to customers please do let me know. We certainly are not trying to hide anything.

Ian

Ian,

I certainly appreciate your prompt and constructive response. When I moved to BBYW I had a fax2email problem (it was cancelled, now reinstated) and I asked to go back to PAYG and was told by Customer Support this was not possible. I have more faith in you that some Customer Support agents so it what you say is true please would you commutate this to them.

I was on 2GB PAYG but sometimes went up to 3 or 4 GB so BBYW Opt 2 was a better bet. I don't do any P2P etc so the restrictions are not CURRENTLY a problem. With PAYG PlusNet had often said that the product had very little restrictions or shaping as the customer paid for what they downloaded (how very true). I naively assumed this would also be the case for BBYW - are we not paying for what we download here as well?

This is certainly not explained on the BBYW product pages. You will say the information on restrictions/shaping is now not for internal use only and is published. Well true but you make it very difficult to find.

See my entries (quartzconsulting) in pages 2 and 3 of this thread...

http://portal.plus.net/central/forums/viewtopic.php?t=55277&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15

It's an old record but why do we need shaping and restrictions on a product where we pay for what we download. At least why not have the same minimal restrictions on the old PAYG?

The problem is that you aren't really paying for what you use there - you are paying much less if you are the sort of user who needs a sustained download during the evening at line speed. Remember, we don't pay our suppliers by the GB, and we pay something like