Afrihost Uncapped ADSL Feedback (Pt3)

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HapticSimian said:
So this is the second night of atrocious throughput in the North. The entire Easter weekend was fine but last night and this I can't even maintain a medium quality Hulu steam...

There are no obvious indications of anything being wrong - local traces are at sub 18ms and to the US at 200ms or so. Throughput just sucks arse. Testmy.net gives me below 1mbps on a 4mb line.

:(

Oh, no shaping... Supposedly.
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The North is showing normal performance on monitoring, so I'm surprised that you're seeing different.

Are you seeing throughput differences in local and international bandwidth?
 
AfriMan said:
The North is showing normal performance on monitoring, so I'm surprised that you're seeing different.

Are you seeing throughput differences in local and international bandwidth?
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There was a substantial difference, yes. Watched a few clips on Youtube after becoming annoyed with the Hulu stop-motion experience, and they played happily at 720p.
 
Shaping hasn't changed at all. My 4mbps uncapped account isn't able to manage more than 80GB per month and another 1mbps uncapped account is so badly shaped at 9GB usage for the month that I doubt it will get to 10GB.

Note the cancellation pending on the 1mbps account:

Data Used: 9.58 GB
Average Daily Usage: 426.36 MB
Projected Monthly Usage: 12.49 GB

Account Status: Cancellation Pending
Shaping Policy: 25% Download/ 12.5% P2P
Latest IP Address: Not Available

Since I can get 200GB capped data for the same price as uncapped 4mbps I've switched to uncapped.

Effectively, 4mbps uncapped in the Cape at the moment really equates to a 100GB cap, since it seems impossible to do much more, so may as well go capped. Since you can have multiple logins on the capped accounts, I'm cancelling all the uncapped accounts and combining into one big capped account - should actually be much cheaper since the uncapped accounts are only really uncapped for "real time" services.
 
AfriMan said:
The upgrade has definitely made a difference, though it was not as dramatic as we hoped. We had hoped to get our full order in order to give Business and Capped full expected performance, improve overall realtime services and to shape less and give clients a period of little to no shaping (Uncapped clients, that is). So for now, it's only shaping that is still quite present, but I do see that we are able to unshape (even though it's after midnight) and the network only sees pretty much full shaping by mid-morning - which is better but maybe not as dramatic as we'd have liked.

Hopefully Telkom will come through quickly for us and we can still deliver that awesome experience we've had in mind since this all started :(
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Hi Afriman,

Perhaps you could explain to me why I am being consistently shaped at the highest level of shaping (12.5%/6.25%). Is 150 gb a month on a 10 mbps line enough to get me classified as a heavy user?
Secondly, if your additional capacity that you requested has been delayed as you say, then you are not currently paying for it. And yet we, the customers, are still paying the full price even though you are making more money because your outlays are not what you expected them to be. How come our poorer service is not being reflected in what we pay. And by poorer, I mean in relation to how it used to be just a couple of months ago. Thanks.
 
HapticSimian said:
There was a substantial difference, yes. Watched a few clips on Youtube after becoming annoyed with the Hulu stop-motion experience, and they played happily at 720p.
Click to expand...

I'm running tests on my side to check if I see an discrepancies in international speeds. Just waiting for my guys in Cape Town to do the same so I can compare.
 
garp said:
Shaping hasn't changed at all. My 4mbps uncapped account isn't able to manage more than 80GB per month and another 1mbps uncapped account is so badly shaped at 9GB usage for the month that I doubt it will get to 10GB.

Note the cancellation pending on the 1mbps account:

Data Used: 9.58 GB
Average Daily Usage: 426.36 MB
Projected Monthly Usage: 12.49 GB

Account Status: Cancellation Pending
Shaping Policy: 25% Download/ 12.5% P2P
Latest IP Address: Not Available

Since I can get 200GB capped data for the same price as uncapped 4mbps I've switched to uncapped.

Effectively, 4mbps uncapped in the Cape at the moment really equates to a 100GB cap, since it seems impossible to do much more, so may as well go capped. Since you can have multiple logins on the capped accounts, I'm cancelling all the uncapped accounts and combining into one big capped account - should actually be much cheaper since the uncapped accounts are only really uncapped for "real time" services.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry that you're not getting the service you expect - we would also like to have improved the overall Uncapped experience more (especially in terms of shaping) had we received all the capacity we expected. I think we have definitely improved real time services greatly, and I'm seeing more clients shaped less and unshaped more quickly since the upgrade on Thursday. I've also seen plenty of Uncapped clients who were still able to pull a decent amount of data last month and this month, so I think there is still good value in Uncapped, depending on what your needs are. And once we receive more capacity - I think this will definitely be a very awesome experience as it should be.
 
Mualliq said:
Hi Afriman,

Perhaps you could explain to me why I am being consistently shaped at the highest level of shaping (12.5%/6.25%). Is 150 gb a month on a 10 mbps line enough to get me classified as a heavy user?
Secondly, if your additional capacity that you requested has been delayed as you say, then you are not currently paying for it. And yet we, the customers, are still paying the full price even though you are making more money because your outlays are not what you expected them to be. How come our poorer service is not being reflected in what we pay. And by poorer, I mean in relation to how it used to be just a couple of months ago. Thanks.
Click to expand...

With the capacity before the upgrade, increased usage means that we still pay more for the increased bandwidth usage, even though we are essentially getting the same revenue (as essentially usage increased mainly due to free line upgrades). So in order to get more capacity, we have to risk committing more financial commitment to secure the additional capacity, as well as the increased data costs for usage, even though this may not directly correspond to increased signups. So this is just to give an idea that it's not about us pocketing huge revenues and squeezing clients for profits, we are also definitely feeling a pinch to ensure we deliver a good internet experience
 
Mualliq said:
Hi Afriman,

Perhaps you could explain to me why I am being consistently shaped at the highest level of shaping (12.5%/6.25%). Is 150 gb a month on a 10 mbps line enough to get me classified as a heavy user?
Secondly, if your additional capacity that you requested has been delayed as you say, then you are not currently paying for it. And yet we, the customers, are still paying the full price even though you are making more money because your outlays are not what you expected them to be. How come our poorer service is not being reflected in what we pay. And by poorer, I mean in relation to how it used to be just a couple of months ago. Thanks.
Click to expand...

Sorry, also to address the other part of your question - it all depends on realtime demand at the time. If you want me to check your account to see if you're being shaped according to your usage pattern correctly - then please drop me a PM :)
 
AfriMan said:
I'm sorry that you're not getting the service you expect - we would also like to have improved the overall Uncapped experience more (especially in terms of shaping) had we received all the capacity we expected. I think we have definitely improved real time services greatly, and I'm seeing more clients shaped less and unshaped more quickly since the upgrade on Thursday. I've also seen plenty of Uncapped clients who were still able to pull a decent amount of data last month and this month, so I think there is still good value in Uncapped, depending on what your needs are. And once we receive more capacity - I think this will definitely be a very awesome experience as it should be.
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Afrihost uncapped ADSL is like petrol at the moment, you get less and less for the same amount each month :p
 
aybbleek said:
Afrihost uncapped ADSL is like petrol at the moment, you get less and less for the same amount each month :p
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I know it may seem like that, but I do believe that when we review, we'll find a way to give clients more than what they expect, even if we have to concentrate that into long unshaped periods when we have the capacity to do so, or mystery discounts to give clients some savings. I think many people would not still be with us if they didn't have faith that we'll make this right with our clients.
 
AfriMan said:
With the capacity before the upgrade, increased usage means that we still pay more for the increased bandwidth usage, even though we are essentially getting the same revenue (as essentially usage increased mainly due to free line upgrades). So in order to get more capacity, we have to risk committing more financial commitment to secure the additional capacity, as well as the increased data costs for usage, even though this may not directly correspond to increased signups. So this is just to give an idea that it's not about us pocketing huge revenues and squeezing clients for profits, we are also definitely feeling a pinch to ensure we deliver a good internet experience
Click to expand...

Even if the increased capital outlay turns out not to bring in more clients, something to consider is the fact that not increasing capacity may lead to existing customers leaving and/or complaining to potential clients, decreasing revenue. While not improving revenue is sad, decreasing it is obviously far more detrimental.

Afrihost's competitors are p*ssing off their existing clients left, right and center. The company should be aware of this by now, what with all the other companies' forum threads full of complaints and people commenting in the Afrihost ones that they've just moved from company X because of Y. I have no doubts that if Afrihost spends a significant amount of money on upgrading its network capacity, this will be regenerated by means of unhappy clients elsewhere seeing a successful, better network and moving to it, and happy current Afrihost clients recommending the service to others.
 
Bl1zz4rd said:
Even if the increased capital outlay turns out not to bring in more clients, something to consider is the fact that not increasing capacity may lead to existing customers leaving and/or complaining to potential clients, decreasing revenue. While not improving revenue is sad, decreasing it is obviously far more detrimental.

Afrihost's competitors are p*ssing off their existing clients left, right and center. The company should be aware of this by now, what with all the other companies' forum threads full of complaints and people commenting in the Afrihost ones that they've just moved from company X because of Y. I have no doubts that if Afrihost spends a significant amount of money on upgrading its network capacity, this will be regenerated by means of unhappy clients elsewhere seeing a successful, better network and moving to it, and happy current Afrihost clients recommending the service to others.
Click to expand...

We've been trying to tell them this via every medium possible bud
 
Bl1zz4rd said:
Even if the increased capital outlay turns out not to bring in more clients, something to consider is the fact that not increasing capacity may lead to existing customers leaving and/or complaining to potential clients, decreasing revenue. While not improving revenue is sad, decreasing it is obviously far more detrimental.

Afrihost's competitors are p*ssing off their existing clients left, right and center. The company should be aware of this by now, what with all the other companies' forum threads full of complaints and people commenting in the Afrihost ones that they've just moved from company X because of Y. I have no doubts that if Afrihost spends a significant amount of money on upgrading its network capacity, this will be regenerated by means of unhappy clients elsewhere seeing a successful, better network and moving to it, and happy current Afrihost clients recommending the service to others.
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There is a lot of truth in what you say - but please bear in mind that we're talking about commitments in the tens of millions of rands - so mistakes can make or break a company. The problem though has never been our willingness to take a risk on our clients, we always believe that our clients will return our trust - it's generally been the turnaround in getting more capacity. For any ISP to consistently maintain unused capacity or 100% IPC redundancy is simply not viable. We have to cut these decisions as fine as possible so that we can stay in business and offer the prices we do. As much as we'd always love to attract more clients - we have to remain in business to do that :)
 
AfriMan said:
I'm sorry that you're not getting the service you expect - we would also like to have improved the overall Uncapped experience more (especially in terms of shaping) had we received all the capacity we expected. I think we have definitely improved real time services greatly, and I'm seeing more clients shaped less and unshaped more quickly since the upgrade on Thursday. I've also seen plenty of Uncapped clients who were still able to pull a decent amount of data last month and this month, so I think there is still good value in Uncapped, depending on what your needs are. And once we receive more capacity - I think this will definitely be a very awesome experience as it should be.
Click to expand...

The capped service works great. In a way, I'm grateful for this as I had 3 uncapped lines at various locations so this forced me to finally do the maths. Converting to a single multiple login 200GB capped account (double data until Sept) will effectively give me 400GB of *unshaped* data for less than the uncapped lines combined (which were barely doing 150GB per month combined). Maybe by Sept the situation will be better and I'll switch back. I urge everyone to do this calculation yourself - look at your total monthly usage on uncapped and see what capped account you can get with the same or more data for much the same price. It's easy to switch back and forth so what's to lose?
 
garp said:
The capped service works great. In a way, I'm grateful for this as I had 3 uncapped lines at various locations so this forced me to finally do the maths. Converting to a single multiple login 200GB capped account (double data until Sept) will effectively give me 400GB of *unshaped* data for less than the uncapped lines combined (which were barely doing 150GB per month combined). Maybe by Sept the situation will be better and I'll switch back. I urge everyone to do this calculation yourself - look at your total monthly usage on uncapped and see what capped account you can get with the same or more data for much the same price. It's easy to switch back and forth so what's to lose?
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We try to offer similar value on all our packages so you can decide what's best for your needs. If you're in multiple locations, a single capped account is a great option :)
 
AfriMan said:
We try to offer similar value on all our packages so you can decide what's best for your needs. If you're in multiple locations, a single capped account is a great option :)
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AfriMan the only reason I'm sticking around with Afrihost is because I know how good the service used to be. Can you push it through to the powers that be to get mystery discounts or bonus turbo charges allocated as soon as possible to your uncapped users? I think this gesture of good will would go down well with your currently unhappy clients.
 
aybbleek said:
AfriMan the only reason I'm sticking around with Afrihost is because I know how good the service used to be. Can you push it through to the powers that be to get mystery discounts or bonus turbo charges allocated as soon as possible to your uncapped users? I think this gesture of good will would go down well with your currently unhappy clients.
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Giving all of us more Turbocharge will be the same as unshaping us for a short while. If they could do it, they would. The network can't handle it at the moment.
 
Bl1zz4rd said:
Giving all of us more Turbocharge will be the same as unshaping us for a short while. If they could do it, they would. The network can't handle it at the moment.
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Then how about shaping the capped users' "free double bandwidth"? At the end of the day they are getting it for "free" so they can't really complain if it gets shaped, right?
 
aybbleek said:
AfriMan the only reason I'm sticking around with Afrihost is because I know how good the service used to be. Can you push it through to the powers that be to get mystery discounts or bonus turbo charges allocated as soon as possible to your uncapped users? I think this gesture of good will would go down well with your currently unhappy clients.
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That's a management decision that I can't really make here. But I can definitely pass the message up the chain. But I'm pretty sure that our directors are looking at the best way to reward all the clients who have hung in there with us :)
 
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