Uncapped ADSL fair usage policies of ISPs comparison

It's all smoke and mirrors as far as I'm concerned. This is why it's always better not to sign a contract. That way you can bounce around between ISP's with a maximum of 1 months notice.
 
I really hope this shuts all the "my ISP doesn't do it" members up a bit! All ISPs need to shape or "prioritise" traffic - that is the nature of a shared access service allowing for affordable pricing. It is the reason packet switched networks have been winning against connection orientated circuits over time, they are just more efficient overall, but not without some cost.

Realise that no matter which ISP you go to if you completely abuse your link they will eventually get around to hammering you. MWEB is the latest to do this, but previously there were big complaints from Cybersmart users, WebAfrica and the rest of the IS reseller crew, Afrihost before that at one point and so on. Openweb requires you to shift accounts to keep high bandwidth rates on occasion - the list goes on.

To put it bluntly if you are doing more than 1/5th of your monthly potential download capacity each month you are blatantly abusing your line - you cannot watch that much HD content, download distros etc. ISPs need to turn a profit to stay in business, so telling them to get stuffed when you are abusing them is really short-sighted, now I don't advocate the previous highly inflated prices, but they are doing pretty well now - we just need specific areas of the national and metro links to get sorted out and we will be able to get more for the same price.

I do like it when ISPs are transparent about how they implement their policies, it would be nice to see MWEB get a little more open about their processes.
 
I had a problem with MWEB starting about a year ago and they always denied that they were NOT throttling me eventually I switched to another ISP and I experienced a similar problem and they admitted straight away what they were doing. So this is not a new thing for MWEB. They always blamed it on Telkom. I just wish ISP's would tell you at what point do they start downgrading your service.
 
Bern said:
it would be nice to see MWEB get a little more open about their processes.
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+1 That is the reason why I left Mweb in the end. Yes I got one of these letters and I was okay to adjust my usage but when I saw they were refusing to disclose what counts as abuse I decided that they no longer deserve my money or time. I cannot be throttled for abuse if I myself do not know what their definition of abuse is. You yourself are guessing that it is 1/5th, what happens if they throttle you at 1/5th still think it is reasonable? Also please bear in mind that a lot of people in the threads were not saying "my ISP does not do it" but rather "I know what my ISP's limits are" big difference and something Mweb can't seem to wrap their heads around. At the end of the day what they are doing is dishonest and I left, I don't expect everyone to agree with me and thats fine but I will make it known where I can because I can.
 
Anakha56 said:
+1 That is the reason why I left Mweb in the end. Yes I got one of these letters and I was okay to adjust my usage but when I saw they were refusing to disclose what counts as abuse I decided that they no longer deserve my money or time. I cannot be throttled for abuse if I myself do not know what their definition of abuse is. You yourself are guessing that it is 1/5th, what happens if they throttle you at 1/5th still think it is reasonable? Also please bear in mind that a lot of people in the threads were not saying "my ISP does not do it" but rather "I know what my ISP's limits are" big difference and something Mweb can't seem to wrap their heads around. At the end of the day what they are doing is dishonest and I left, I don't expect everyone to agree with me and thats fine but I will make it known where I can because I can.
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I for one fully agree with you, I emailed them and the guy who responded told me " Regarding what is deemed excessive, these figures are not available." The problem I see is some households have many users so for an example a buddy of mine works night shift so he is active on the web during the day and his family at night, this means his line easily goes past 4/5ths of its maximum capacity. Is this him trying to abuse the line? Not in my eyes, he paid for a service that he is now using. If he knew what is deemed excessive then they could simply calm it down to those limits. What mweb is doing is scaring customers into not using their paid for service in fear of being throttled.
 
Zuner, you may have misunderstood, I didn't mean it is a problem to max your line, just to do it for more than 1/5th constantly you have to realise you are stepping out if a "home" type package profile and can expect to be booted. In the US a lot of the providers do not allow you to host servers on home packages for example.

Normal browsing is actually quite light on data usage, you load the page then your line is clear until you load a new page.
 
I knew all the ISPs shape/throttle/"prioritize" their uncapped services in various ways, but the exact way they do it makes a huge difference.

I prefer the "on-demand" way, as in, when network traffic is reaching a peak then apply various rules. I'm also happy if they apply the rules more strictly on users who sits on the top x% at the given moment. The emphasis here is "on-demand" , which means it is entirely based on what is happening on the network during a given period.

Mweb on the other hand is not doing this, they are going to penalise/throttle you the moment you are in their "3%" , regardless of what is happening on the network at the time. There's thus no way for the user to actually DO something about it, it's not like they can schedule their download for 3am at night (and having a chance of getting full speed due to low traffic). The user will be STUCK and with little idea when and how long before he/she will return to normal speeds. So what's going to happen? User will have to switch to another account/ISP and/or completely stop using the internet to "recover".

Afrihost had this exact thing about 2 years ago, i'm still not sure how their calculations worked at the time, but i got throttled for 30 days but continued to use my account at the slower speed. After 30 days, it turned out i was still above the threshold and the throttle continued. There was never clarity how much less i must use to get the throttled "lifted" and how long it's going to take, there was no way for me to manage it at all, and hence i was forced to move to another ISP. Luckily Afrihost stopped this horrible way of doing things, but now Mweb is doing the same thing.

The next problem with using a "3%" thing is, and i'm sure this was the case with Afrihost too. The top 3% is a moving target, lets say the top 3% right now is all using 300GB on their 4MB/s accounts, and now they all leave. The Top 3% will now be replaced by the next bunch who might be using only 150GB a month, and they will leave or stop using their account when they get throttled and eventually the "average" user will end up in the 3% bracket despite not actually using excessively. So maybe Mweb might adjust their policy it that time, but this also means everyone is in the dark as to how the FUP works....which in turns means the user have ZERO CONTROL as their is no target . The only way Mweb can give the user control is to actually tell them where they are in the "top %" usage and how far are they from being thrown into the top 3%. That would be quite sensitive data to provide to users methinks....
 
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Bern said:
Zuner, you may have misunderstood, I didn't mean it is a problem to max your line, just to do it for more than 1/5th constantly you have to realise you are stepping out if a "home" type package profile and can expect to be booted. In the US a lot of the providers do not allow you to host servers on home packages for example.

Normal browsing is actually quite light on data usage, you load the page then your line is clear until you load a new page.
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1/5 is actually pathetic. so your saying you shouldn't max your line more than 20% of the month. what am I paying for then???
 
crackersa said:
1/5 is actually pathetic. so your saying you shouldn't max your line more than 20% of the month. what am I paying for then???
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You're not paying for 1:1 contention ratio. Yes, some people use less data so they subsidize the guys who do max out their lines the whole month. What MWEB is trying to do is reduce this cross-subsidization. Looks fair to me but they should be open about what's the limit before throttling starts.
 
The answer what I want is not in the article.

Yes, as a party you may agree within contract that you will agree to policy changes without notice. I’m also sure that all parties should be aware when amendments (when and what changed) are made and that all terms and conditions (many within policies) should be known.

A policy is a principle or rule to guide decisions and achieve rational outcomes it also statement OF intent, and is implemented as a procedure or protocol. Polices can assist in both SUBJECTIVE and OBJECTIVE decision making. Policies isn’t law, while law can compel or prohibit behaviours, policy guides actions toward those that are most likely to achieve a desired outcome.

Policy Content:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Policy

Policies are typically promulgated through official written documents. Policy documents often come with the endorsement or signature of the executive powers within an organization to legitimize the policy and demonstrate that it is considered in force. Such documents often have standard formats that are particular to the organization issuing the policy. While such formats differ in form, policy documents usually contain certain standard components including:

  • A purpose statement, outlining why the organization is issuing the policy, and what its desired effect or outcome of the policy should be.
  • An applicability and scope statement, describing who the policy affects and which actions are impacted by the policy. The applicability and scope may expressly exclude certain people, organizations, or actions from the policy requirements. Applicability and scope is used to focus the policy on only the desired targets, and avoid unintended consequences where possible.
  • An effective date which indicates when the policy comes into force. Retroactive policies are rare, but can be found.
  • A responsibilities section, indicating which parties and organizations are responsible for carrying out individual policy statements. Many policies may require the establishment of some ongoing function or action. For example, a purchasing policy might specify that a purchasing office be created to process purchase requests, and that this office would be responsible for ongoing actions. Responsibilities often include identification of any relevant oversight and/or governance structures.
  • Policy statements indicating the specific regulations, requirements, or modifications to organizational behavior that the policy is creating. Policy statements are extremely diverse depending on the organization and intent, and may take almost any form.

    Some policies may contain additional sections, including:
  • Background, indicating any reasons, history, and intent that led to the creation of the policy, which may be listed as motivating factors. This information is often quite valuable when policies must be evaluated or used in ambiguous situations, just as the intent of a law can be useful to a court when deciding a case that involves that law.
  • Definitions, providing clear and unambiguous definitions for terms and concepts found in the policy document.
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As I can conclude, the amended MWEB AUP (or/and incl. FUP) as a usage policy which will be in EFFECT FROM 1 SEPTEMBER 2013 is transparent in regard with MWEB uncapped user decision making by withholding the limits, parameters and variables etc. Thus the uncapped data usage can be any undetermined amount to include the top 3% (or more by MWEB’s own discretion) within the entire 100%. The amended policy is unclear in regard with data usage and this is not only questionable but highly unethical when a MWEB uncapped user pay to utilise the service as it has been advertised. Since the complaints started, no clarity have been received, but rather arrogant remarks toward MWEB users who asks to be enlightened.

These MWEB uncapped advertised services cannot include the term uncapped anymore as there is no certain data amount published within any media, thus the uncapped product can be limited by the organisation to legitimize the usage policy and demonstrate that it is considered in FORCE to overwrite their MWEB uncapped marketing campaign to SOFT-CAP the service. This when the MWEB organisation have an active “Free the Web” campaign, isn’t this hypocritical?

This is not law that can prohibit behaviour as I already established, the MWEB uncapped users have a right to know what is acceptable than be unknowledgeable have their usage behaviour prohibited by a policy. These policies should protect all parties and not only the organisation.

Necuno have already posted numerous times the limits that other ISP’s published, not only within their policies, but also when requested.
 
Bern said:
Zuner, you may have misunderstood, I didn't mean it is a problem to max your line, just to do it for more than 1/5th constantly you have to realise you are stepping out if a "home" type package profile and can expect to be booted. In the US a lot of the providers do not allow you to host servers on home packages for example.

Normal browsing is actually quite light on data usage, you load the page then your line is clear until you load a new page.
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Who here is hosting servers on their ADSL line? That's a bit far fetched a stretched just to make your point.

Why do the ISP's not come clean with their contention ratio then we would know what to expect and talk with our wallets. Openweb do not seem to have a huge problem but I think it's because they are not so fscking greeedy and do not have to cross subsidise DSTV.
 
1/5th is ridiculous, looks like we going back in time.

btw MWeb have always throttled speeds during the day/business hours, i noticed.. but if they pull a throttle 24/7 I will be moving all 3 of my lines.
 
I am on Telkom, and I actually really like how they do it where you can view how close you are to the orange/red section on a graph.
 
roguemat said:
I am on Telkom, and I actually really like how they do it where you can view how close you are to the orange/red section on a graph.
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That's exactly Mweb's problem.....you download...then suddenly NOTHING ( no warning or whatever that you're busy reaching your "throttling" stage ))
 
crackersa said:
1/5 is actually pathetic. so your saying you shouldn't max your line more than 20% of the month. what am I paying for then???
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Yup, that is exactly what I am saying. The way ADSL and similar home type services work is they buy a bunch of national and international bandwidth and then oversubscribe it to reduce the retail price. Home users generally use less, so they can oversubscribe further allowing for cheaper products. Businesses normally use consistently more bandwidth, thus get higher prices (and then you can add SLA options to this).

If you go and hammer what is normally something upwards of 25:1 overall contention and use 20% consistently you are effectively getting a LOT more than you are paying for and most likely adversely affecting the other subscribers experience.

Now try put your personal budget aside and look at it from the ISP side, they need to make a profit or they go out of business. Is your short term benefit the long term effect of no more deals like this?

I don't like the way MWEB specifically is going about this, but you need to understand the market and how these products are created to understand the pricing and FUP.

Seriously said:
Who here is hosting servers on their ADSL line? That's a bit far fetched a stretched just to make your point.

Why do the ISP's not come clean with their contention ratio then we would know what to expect and talk with our wallets. Openweb do not seem to have a huge problem but I think it's because they are not so fscking greeedy and do not have to cross subsidise DSTV.
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If you do torrents you are essentially hosting a server. You are serving up data to other client hosts.

krycor said:
1/5th is ridiculous, looks like we going back in time.

btw MWeb have always throttled speeds during the day/business hours, i noticed.. but if they pull a throttle 24/7 I will be moving all 3 of my lines.
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1/5 is avery reasonable if you look at how the product is put together. Do you expect them to make a loss or for everyone else to have bad speeds because of your torrent abuse? Get a business line with lower contention ratios if you need such huge bandwidth and stop being a leech on the system.
 
Fulcrum29 said:
The answer what I want is not in the article.

Yes, as a party you may agree within contract that you will agree to policy changes without notice. I’m also sure that all parties should be aware when amendments (when and what changed) are made and that all terms and conditions (many within policies) should be known.

A policy is a principle or rule to guide decisions and achieve rational outcomes it also statement OF intent, and is implemented as a procedure or protocol. Polices can assist in both SUBJECTIVE and OBJECTIVE decision making. Policies isn’t law, while law can compel or prohibit behaviours, policy guides actions toward those that are most likely to achieve a desired outcome.

Policy Content:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Policy

Policies are typically promulgated through official written documents. Policy documents often come with the endorsement or signature of the executive powers within an organization to legitimize the policy and demonstrate that it is considered in force. Such documents often have standard formats that are particular to the organization issuing the policy. While such formats differ in form, policy documents usually contain certain standard components including:



As I can conclude, the amended MWEB AUP (or/and incl. FUP) as a usage policy which will be in EFFECT FROM 1 SEPTEMBER 2013 is transparent in regard with MWEB uncapped user decision making by withholding the limits, parameters and variables etc. Thus the uncapped data usage can be any undetermined amount to include the top 3% (or more by MWEB’s own discretion) within the entire 100%. The amended policy is unclear in regard with data usage and this is not only questionable but highly unethical when a MWEB uncapped user pay to utilise the service as it has been advertised. Since the complaints started, no clarity have been received, but rather arrogant remarks toward MWEB users who asks to be enlightened.

These MWEB uncapped advertised services cannot include the term uncapped anymore as there is no certain data amount published within any media, thus the uncapped product can be limited by the organisation to legitimize the usage policy and demonstrate that it is considered in FORCE to overwrite their MWEB uncapped marketing campaign to SOFT-CAP the service. This when the MWEB organisation have an active “Free the Web” campaign, isn’t this hypocritical?

This is not law that can prohibit behaviour as I already established, the MWEB uncapped users have a right to know what is acceptable than be unknowledgeable have their usage behaviour prohibited by a policy. These policies should protect all parties and not only the organisation.

Necuno have already posted numerous times the limits that other ISP’s published, not only within their policies, but also when requested.
Click to expand...
Is it fair to announce the implementation of a new policy less than one calender month before it is implemented. If I don't like the new policy I am still stuck as I have to give a calender month's notice if I want to terminate the service.
 
I think this needs to be taking up with ASA etc.. as 'uncapped' needs to have a certain level of service before its truly uncapped.
A 1Mbps has a down link throughput of about 316 GB max.. what im trying to say is this.. if the usuage limit constituing abuse is less than 50% of the max possible on the line, then that is obvious over zealous & greed of the ISP. no fool can deny that and as such im sure ASA will have issues with it.
 
Allin said:
Is it fair to announce the implementation of a new policy less than one calender month before it is implemented. If I don't like the new policy I am still stuck as I have to give a calender month's notice if I want to terminate the service.
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I’m a MWEB Premium 4MB Uncapped user which I use in personal capacity, no mail was sent to me related to this debacle. I’m challenging this due to the transparency, soon what is good to be implemented by one company will soon be good to be implemented by another company.

I want this challenged by law, one thing that I cannot stand is an entity being unethical and downright criminal (MWEB have not ventured here yet in my books), especially within business conduct.

Remember that you already agreed to any policy amendments without notice, the question rather is what is the terms and conditions which applies to the usage policy, this in regard with the policy purpose, application and scope, responsibilities, background, statements and LASTLY THE DEFINITIONS, PROVIDING CLEAR AND UNAMBIGUOUS DEFINITIONS FOR TERMS AND CONCEPTS FOUND IN THE POLICY DOCUMENT.

Policies like this is made to screw the CPA and desired marketed segment.

I sincerely hope that this will be challenged by law.
 
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