Sorry PlusNet - Im Off

I've been a customer of Plusnet since October 2002.

I've always loved the service and never had a problem. I've looked past any little niggles - speed issues, connectivity etc, because frankly, it's normal. I expect it.

But recently, things have been a joke.

I mean, Im still on Premier Option 1. It has a 20 Gig "Peak" allowance, except it isn't, because as soon as I reach 12 Gig, it says, "Oh, you havent downloaded your allowance yet, we're going to throttle you anyway to 2 Meg".

That alone is bad enough. I've had it a few times, more so with the recent advance of ITV Player, BBC iPlayer, iTunes downloads and Demand Five.

When am I supposed to watch these? When Im in Bed?

Not even related to the 2 Meg throttling, Im sitting here trying to download an 8 Meg file from iTunes, and it says it's going to take 20 minutes to download! That's abysmal!

BBC iPlayer and iTunes both report 0x60 in their differentiated services and Im told that even things such as Dell and Microsoft downloads are similarly restricted.

People have been having problems with this for several months, and I swear the majority of this is due to the ellacoya traffic shaping systems which, lets be honest, is designed to get as many people as possible into the smallest amount of bandwidth - and then marketed as as something we should all want.

I can't do anything at home except stream videos which are classed as 0x80 (Gold) and I can't do that any more due to reaching 12 Gig!

So I've been having a look at the PlusNet alternatives. But even these don't inspire me with confidence. I'll have even worse traffic shaping issues on PlusNet Unlimited, and PlusNet Pro will give me even less capacity per month as Im restricted to 15 Gig - not between 4pm and midnight as Premier, but between 8am and midnight, and as there are people at home between that time, I'll be stuffed!

So after much thinking and soul searching, it's been a cracking 7 years PlusNet, there's been some highs, some lows, but I think the bridges have been burnt for this loyal customer.

I've got my MAC Code, and migrated to Be.

I come on here looking for anything positive I can find, and I see people who can get charges waived just for posting in a public forum, where as if they went through the automated system, would have to pay a huge cost up front to pay off a contract just to upgrade.

The only thing that would persuade me to come back, is for:

a) PlusNet to get more capacity
b) ADSL2
c) Better allowances/range of packages - 15 Gig is a joke.

Cya
Simon

Hi sjdean,

It's always really sad to see a long standing customer leave us.

I might have an idea though Have you thought about "trying unlimited? I understand that longer contracts can be a bit off-putting when you're not sure if they'll work out for you or not. I would be perfectly happy for you to move to unlimited and if it's not working out for you within the first month, we can move you back to wear you were and if you still want to canceel then sobeit. What do you think?

Also, we have added a bunch of capacity so far this year. I can't remember off the top of my head, but I think it's in the region of 1.2Gbps. And we are running an ADSL2 trial. You can have a read on the latest here:

http://community.plus.net/blog/2009/05/29/21cn-trial...

If you do decide that you're still wanting to cancel, I hope everything works out well for you and you'll always be woelcome back

Honestly, I am gutted. I don't like leaving like this. I've never been happy with traffic shaping, and the 13 Meg cut offs really have taken their toll on Premier. So Im not really happy with considering either product you have on offer at the moment.

I do worry about Unlimited because the shaping seems to be a lot worse when compared with Premier, and at the moment, even taking into account the 2 Meg limit, I feel the Premier product is unusable.

I feel that most of it is just pure congestion.

I wouldn't mind trialling Unlimited just in case, but I have submitted my MAC Code to Be. If Unlimited was good, then Im not sure how I could get out of it - there has to be a cooling off period.

Cheers
Simon

In reply to a post by sjdean:

Honestly, I am gutted. I don't like leaving like this. I've never been happy with traffic shaping, and the 13 Meg cut offs really have taken their toll on Premier. So Im not really happy with considering either product you have on offer at the moment.

We're mindful that average usage is on the rise and whilst I'm certainly not promising anything we're going to look at revisiting the usage thresholds on the legacy Premier product.

Most of my other thoughts/comments surrounding your departure I'm sure you've already seen over on p.s.customer-feedback

Sorry to see you go

I will keep an eye out for the latest news on PlusNet. You guys have done something right to keep me for seven years. Virtually no tickets submitted, really reliable service.

As I said on the newsgroup, proposal, PlusNet Simplicity - 50 Gig download. Download as much as you want, whenever you want, no traffic shaping. Let human nature work things out.

Just promise you'll investigate why my connection has been dog slow during traffic shaping hours (and I mean upto 44 times slower) to help any other customers.

Cheers
Simon

You can have exactly that package now - Plusnet Pro with an extra 35GB of usage.

"I wouldn't mind trialling Unlimited just in case, but I have submitted my MAC Code to Be."

Yep, you'll never care again. It'll just work, you can do what you like, and you never have to think about allowances ever again. Truely refreshing stuff!

In reply to a post by therioman:

"I wouldn't mind trialling Unlimited just in case, but I have submitted my MAC Code to Be."

Yep, you'll never care again. It'll just work, you can do what you like, and you never have to think about allowances ever again. Truely refreshing stuff!

Agreed. No throttling, no traffic management, no download limits and up to 24Mbps.

Why would you want to stay with Plusnet?