Download Limits

I switched to Zen a few months ago and so far have been happy with the service they've provided. They've done everything they said they would and have been completely up front about their usage policy, with no hidden caps or throttling.

Unfortunately, I've made a mistake; I've underestimated just how much bandwith I use in a month. I don't consider myself to be a heavy user and thought the 25Gb/month limit on the 8000 active package would be plenty. I rarely use torrents or other file sharing applications and use my Internet access for e-mail, web surfing, podcasts and the Playstation Network. However, I'm finding that I'm averaging about 1Gb per day and am hitting my usage limit every month, meaning that for the last week or so of each month I can't use my Internet access how I would like.

I know that Zen allows you to buy additional capacity and also has a 50Gb per month package but they are pretty expensive. I realise I'm asking for clairvoyancy but does anyone have any ideas how often Zen looks at and refreshes the packages they offer, particularly with regards to their download limits? I don't particularly want to switch ISPs again, especially as I am completely happy with Zen in every other respect.

As an aside, do you think the download limits that all ISPs offer match the needs of their customers? I'm now using around 30Gb per month through what I consider to be normal usage, which not too long ago would have had a lot of ISPs waving their Fair Use Policy at me. Are ISPs keeping up with their customers demands for more and more bandwith?

Edited by Ratel (Sat 18-Oct-08 14:29:45)

Zen only recently upped the allowance from 20GB to 25GB, so I would suggest a year or so before more changes, unless wholesale pricing changed a lot in the meantime.

Those doing 30GB during normal peak hours e.g. 6pm to 11pm will generally be around the same price as Zen, exceptions apply if you can get LLU from Sky, Be or O2

A Entanet reseller might be worth a look, but depends on whether you are happy keeping usage off-peak.

BTW PlaystationNetwork with 1.5GB demos can quickly eat your allowance, I suffer the same thing. Alas the industry as a whole still sees this sort of usage as rare, back in April 2008 a big provider like TalkTalk was published that 50% of its users used less than 1GB a month, and the average overall was just 2.5 to 3GB (variation depending on whether traffic shaping was on)

Thanks for the reply, didn't know that Zen had only recently increased the download limit. I guess I may have to start looking around again, which is a shame. Seen a few ISPs that are little more lenient if you do your downloading in off peak hours, which isn't a problem, podcasts and PSN downloads can all be done at night whilst I'm asleep.

Would be interesting to see if those usage rates have changed even since April now that there are more video on demand services and all the terrestial TV channels offer catch up services. Then again, I imagine there is a huge number of people who use the net soley for e-mail, web surfing, online shopping, etc.