Slow speed same price?

Petegrancan

I am with Waitrose and have been for years. Last January I went ‘broadband' and stayed with Waitrose because I had always had good service especially the free help line which for an amateur surfer is a real bonus!! (Albeit in India and you have to listen very intently to the operator sometimes). However my problems started when they announced that if I was eligible I could have up to 8MB at no extra charge, great I thought. Once it was setup, only 6MB, (it took three weeks because of BT) my line started dropping out a lot. I complained to Waitrose and they said they would monitor the line. They did and hay! I was telling the truth so they passed it to BT who tested the line and said it couldn’t take the 6MB I was getting. ‘They’ reduced it somehow and it’s still dropping out but not as often and I am now getting between 2.8 and 3.4 MB. When I asked Waitrose if I could get a reduction in line rental they drew my attention to the terms and conditions saying they would supply me with up to 8MB. Ok, but I am paying the same price for an inferior service as other customers who get 8MB, surely this is not only bad practice but discrimination as I am not being treated equally. I am being penalised because BT cannot upgrade their equipment to enable me and MANY other customers to have a fast reliable internet connection. Does anybody know/can advise who I should contact to try and get anything done???

mad_rich

Unfortunately most ISPs offer a service 'up to' x MB, while warning that you may not get the full speed. The best thing to do, now that you have established what your line's capable of, is find an ISP that offers 'up to' 4MB for a decent price - that way you're not wasting money.

Petegrancan

Thanks Rich
Could do but I’m tied in till January…. but it gives me plenty of time to look around. I suppose my main beef is with BT as it’s their inferior supply, be it copper cables or old equipment in general. If they don’t clean up my line, BT said it had lots of ‘noise’ on it, then I guess I won’t get a faster, reliable service from anyone!! Wish we were in a cable area!!

mad_rich

One other thing - I've just been upgraded by Virgin to 8MBPS. Did a couple of speed checks and found I was still only getting around 2MBPS.

Then I tried plugging in my ADSL router directly into the BT master socket and the speed is reliably up to 4MBPS now. (You actually have to take the screws off the faceplate and use the internal socket - this has the effect of cutting off all the extensions though, so don't be expecting any phone calls!)

Make sure you're using a decent quality microfilter as well.

This won't help with the noise on BT's bit of the line, but the few metres of cabling in your house is probably considerably lower quality than twisted copper wires between you and the exchange.

Petegrancan

Great tip Rich BUT Waitrose got me to try that one to ensure my line was not affecting the speed as you rightly say it does! Its still connected that way so heaven knows what it would be like if it wasn’t! Probably not much worse! We even got BT to change the master box because that was very old and you cold see verdigre (spelling?) on the connections! The phone line is crackle free as a result!

Petegrancan

Thought I would give you (all) an update on the situation.

Waitrose technical support have been in contact and I must say that they go out of their way to contact me and keep me informed BUT, and you knew there was going to be a but here is what they say.

“The Supervisor of our Broadband Department Tried to contact you to let you know that Bt have done investigations into
the speed problems that you were having and found that the speeds that you are getting is acceptable to them and nothing can
be done to increase the speeds higher.

Acceptable to them??????? Well its not acceptable to me and many others!! On Wednesday my speed test showed that it had dropped below 2Mb, 1.7 ish. But BT think that I should be happy with that and aren’t I lucky that its not dropping out!!!

I have told Waitrose that I am still not happy with the service, I realise that they are up against BT but PLEASE keep on with this because if ‘we’ all rollover and accept a third rate service then BT will be laughing all the way to the bank!! I have also asked (again) for a reduction in my line rental because of the inferior service that is dropping below 2Mb and I am waiting for customer services to reply.

How many others have been told similar from BT/ISP ? If more people complain about the copper wires/old exchanges (they say my exchange should manage 5MB) that are holding us back the better, but of course, we are in a monopoly situation (no cable near us and many others in this country) so it’s a up hill struggle.

Right! Off soap box, have a good weekend!! I’m off to the balloon fiesta at Bristol!!

lee634

OK I do understand your situation, But in reality its a telephone line into your house not a broadband line, the fact that modern technology has enabled us to you these lines for broadband is a great step in the right direction,
Just remember a few years ago when you was still on dial up,

why do you feel you should get a reduction when it was a free upgrade in the first place,

Don't get me wrong I am not having a go as I am in the same situation but I can only just get B/B 512Kbs is a max because I live so far from the exchange, I am lucky I can get it at all

Petegrancan

Granted you’re on ‘my side’ but it’s exactly your attitude that I refer to. We should demand a better service and not think “oh I’m so grateful for what I’m getting” (my words not yours LOL!) And you seem to be saying that ‘we’ should accept and make do with old technology. No!! make BT upgrade and improve their lines, equipment and ultimately their service to us the customer.

Yes it was a free upgrade but I’m not getting (at times) the 2MB, the minimum speed that Waitrose advertise as supplying BB. And as I pointed out before the inequality of the service is bad, why should I accept a poor service for the same money?

It also highlights the seduction of companies that advertise 8MB + speeds when they know full well that to get it you have to live next to the exchange or fibre optic cables into your house!!

lee634

I do understand your point exactly, and get annoyed with the fact that I can only just get the minimum 512k connection,
For the last two years I was living in Belgium and although the phone line charge was higher over there than BT at least their quality of service was 10x better as well, initialy we had 3Mb B/B it was either that or nothing then a free upgrade to 6 Mb, you can see where their profits go rather than lining the pockets of the fat cats over hear, Maybe we should start a National petition to get these Telecoms provider i.e BT to maybe stop taking such large bonuses and put the money back into providing a quality of service that everbody would be happy to pair for,

Right i'm off my box now as well

normanmark

Petegrancan wrote:

How many others have been told similar from BT/ISP ? If more people complain about the copper wires/old exchanges (they say my exchange should manage 5MB) that are holding us back the better, but of course, we are in a monopoly situation (no cable near us and many others in this country) so it’s a up hill struggle.

hahaha

BT are not going to change a perfectly good telephone network so people can get peace of mind of another 1mb speed on broadband, broadband has & always be seen as a comodity, if the telephone service does no longer work or is dated then we'll see an change. (21CN is the new wave of technology coming through)

lee634

normanmark wrote:

hahaha

broadband has & always be seen as a comodity,

A commodity which they will happily take your money for,