Yeah, i know that's why VOX is more expensive, BUT. It will also remove one of the needs for uncapped. Even if you have a limit of how much data can be carried over, it gives a lot of freedom to the user and may actually remove the need for uncapped. Since I have no idea how much data I will use every month, I use uncapped, it's just more practical for me. But if I know that my slow months can make up for my bad months, then no need for uncapped.
Would also make it great for a secondary backup account. That way GBs can pile while my primary account is fine, but when there are issues, the backup account will have plenty GBs there for me.
I know you're big on after hours GBs as well as prime time GBs are more expensive, but surely they can be calculated separately?
You're on to something that forms part of our new releases. With respect to uncapped, it's an account type that if used within the parameters of the ISP can get you far more value out of the account than capped. Really the only reason for capped is if the rules underlying the uncapped account don't suit your needs or you're technically unable or even unwilling to abide by them.
Let's look at how we do things: everyone is unshaped on uncapped. Depending on peak usage, we adjust this to dynamic shaping (if need be), and further depending on peak usage, we deprioritise if the usage behaviour exceeds variables in an algorithm I've developed. This is far more fair than say an outright throttle on usage, because if that usage is outside of a peak period for us, why should we use that as contributing towards your shaping status or even throttling status? If your usage doesn't impact on the network significantly, and is within the bounds of being reasonable in terms of overall usage in peak, why should we care?
So that's really what we already do on uncapped, meaning we also have what MyBroadband would call "data hogs" who we are very happy with and whose accounts we don't touch in terms of network management or performance. The difference between basic and premium uncapped on our side is that premium is far more lenient on this, and basic has harsher deprioritisation rules for people who, say, are paying R195 but consuming hundreds of gigs in peak business and consumer hours. When we started Crystal Web the intention was to prove that uncapped is 100% sustainable. We've done this from a network and financial perspective. We're also showing that capped, if you prefer, has great benefits too, and we can add even more (which we are). And after a few ups and downs initially, we've selected the best backbone network in SA and have a spectacular partnership with Internet Solutions on this.
In all honesty, there are 2 very good backbone networks in SA right now, and one spectacularly run backbone network. I won't name the 2, but the one spectacular backbone is IS, there's just no two ways about it. We monitor all backbone networks in SA. If you want further honesty, there are only 3 ethically run ISPs in SA right now. Certain ISPs share data accounts on a pay per account model. Certain ISPs operate uncapped and capped on horrendous contentions. Certain ISPs claim not to throttle, yet they do. And certain ISPs employ combinations of these and more, and get by with decent marketing departments. It's always been our intention to bring openness and integrity to this business from the outset and remains that way. In order to do so, you have to operate on a superlative backbone network; you have to market honestly; you have to admit mistakes and fix them when they happen and communicate this effectively; and you have to evolve your products and business accordingly too. We've done most of these well but have failed on the odd occasion on one or two points, and always looked to rectify them almost immediately. We're far from perfect, and that gives us space to grow and be even better. So choosing an ISP is not always about price, however it has more often than not been the primary deciding factor for most consumers. We've reached price-points that are now low enough (in my opinion) where you can actually be a little picky though about who you opt for, and not simply use price as a determining factor. However "data hogs" as MyBroadband puts it, will nearly always opt for price as the determining factor over value-adds and quality, because it's all about consuming as many TBs as possible. To put this into perspective, the guy doing 8TBs per month costs his ISP at least R20,000 per month (maximum floor minimum he's costing without factoring numerous costs into the equation). Why would you want to advertise this and encourage it? And why would you want to do so while undergoing network problems? And how do your customers feel seeing that, while they can't get decent in-game ping? In my personal opinion (not speaking as the CEO of Crystal Web) that's not something I find very ethical.
Another point on this: IPC which forms the major cost to any ISP (and is often terribly maligned in the media, but is actually a decent product to ISPs from Telkom [but that's another story altogether]) costs the same to all ISPs, but that pricing is on a sliding scale on IPC spend. The more you buy the better operational pricing you can obtain. So when you discover an ISP with great performance, you should encourage everyone to join, contrary to the existing mindset that you should keep it quiet to avoid network contention increasing. Now because this pricing is pretty fixed, it means we all operate off similar cost bases. So when you're talking about a difference in price that is negligible between one provider and another, your real decision (to avoid further headaches later down the line) should, in my experience, be network quality. The pricing on xDSL connectivity has reached a point where you can now value quality more than quantity, and is how we as an ISP for instance make our determinations as well...
using 10Mbps line. Would still like to see the other iSPs added here, especially interested to see Telkom Internet & Vox, the hidden treasures 
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