Mweb Out of Bundle shark

Conack

Conack

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So I downgraded (to 1gb) and cancelled my Mweb account like many others last month, received communications that it's been confirmed. (Thanks MwebGuy, for your assistance with the downgrading).

However, look what I got in the mail this morning:

Dear MWEB Member

We would like to notify you that you have exceeded your standard monthly ADSL cap. You are currently being billed 20c per additional MB for all bandwidth you consume. Your current out-of-cap usage is:

Usage: 4.07 GB

Value: R 833.00

What are your options?

Access local sites only

Once you reach your Safety Lock, your access to international websites will stop but your access to local sites (i.e. sites and servers located in South Africa) will continue. Normal access will then resume on the first day of next month.

Upgrade to Uncapped ADSL

From as little as R199.00 per month enjoy uncapped ADSL. No need to worry about being capped again. Click here for more info!

Switch to the Booster Option

This option allows you to purchase an extra 1.5GB or 3.5GB of data once you've reached you standard monthly ADSL cap. If you switch to the Booster option now it will be effective on the 1st day of next month. If you do not use your entire booster during the month, the unused portion is carried over to the following month (only valid for the next month).

Simply visit MyAccount or call us on 08600 32000 during office hours to switch to the booster option.

Visit MyAccount to view detailed ADSL usage information.

Should you have any further queries in this regard, you are welcome to contact our Sales team at 08600 32000 during office hours.

Kind regards

MWEB Operations
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I've downgraded from an Uncapped to "1Gb Capped" via PM to MwebGuy.
At no point did I, or could I specify that I want to have an "Auto-topup" enabled on the account. While on the uncapped bundle there's no such option in your Client Zone.

I have many clients on Mweb and when they reach they their cap they get the Landing Page stating that they're capped. How come then my account was sneakily set to enable the OOB shark?

Just logged into my Client Zone and apparently I now owe Mweb just short of R1000 :eek:

Mweb Usage.jpg

According to the Clientzone there is a default "Safety Lock" of [ 2.44 GB ], but the system happily let the account go to triple that.

1Gb Capped is 1Gb Capped. How can I get charged R1000 for accidentally going over it?

Posted from a hastily signed-up Afrihost account. (Where by default the capped accounts are capped, as one would expect).
 
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their argument is likely to rest in Part B of their MWEB ADSL and Dial-Up Service Terms
PART B: CAPPED PRODUCTS (Section 8 only applicable to Capped products)

8. MEASURES TO CONTROL OUT OF BUNDLE USAGE WHERE A BASE CAP APPLIES

8.1 We have measures available to limit your access to the ADSL Service when you reach or exceed your Base Cap, which are implemented subject to the provisions of clause 8.5. For more details on measures to control your Out of Bundle Usage, please visit the ADSL Website or contact our call centre.
8.2 You can select either the Booster Based Billing or the Out of Bundle Billing options by logging on to the "My Account" self-administration portal on the ADSL Website. The default billing option for most ADSL Service packages are Out of Bundle Billing. For example, if you have not selected the Booster Based Billing option on My Account you will automatically continue on the Out of Bundle Billing option. In other words, you will automatically be charged per Mb for every additional Mb you use over your Base Cap. Please contact us if you are unsure which billing option you are on in order to avoid any unexpected charges.
8.3 If you have selected the Booster Based Billing option and you reach or exceed your Base Cap, you will only be able to use the ADSL Service to access Local-only Data up to your Free Local-only Access limit. You will however have no access to international websites or content until the start of the next month, unless you buy a Booster; use a Dial-Up Service (where applicable); or increase your Base Cap to a higher Gb factor.
8.4 If you did not select the Booster Based Billing option you will in most instances default to the Out of Bundle Billing options. This means that, once you reach or exceed your Base Cap, you will immediately be charged per Mb for any further data used.
8.5 Disclaimer

8.5.1 Because ADSL Services are session based technology, we do not guarantee the efficiency of any measures available to limit your usage, including without limitation any safety lock.
8.5.2 We accordingly do not accept responsibility if you exceed your Base Cap, and we will charge you for Out of Bundle Usage at our prevailing rates.
8.5.3 You are therefore responsible for monitoring and controlling your use of the ADSL Service.

8.6 Exceeding your Base Cap

8.6.1 From time to time, in any given month, we may allow you, at our discretion, to exceed your Base Cap without stopping your access to the ADSL Service.
8.6.2 However, if we allow you to exceed your Base Cap in this manner, it will merely constitute a temporary indulgence on our part. It will not constitute a waiver of any of our rights, including (without limitation) our right to stop your access to the ADSL Service if you exceed your Base Cap at any time in the future.
8.6.3 If you exceed your Base Cap, we reserve the right to recover from you the cost of the amount of data by which you have exceeded your Base Cap.
Click to expand...

But how did you flob off 4 gigs in a couple of hours?
The honesty of their behaviour could give you an edge in fighting them. At the moment I am dealing with the representations of accounts as unthrottled and then on their own version deciding to throttle in a manner that does not conform to existing guidelines. Whether the term cap contains an implication that there is no OOB - talking about a cap as opposed to a bundle - is a hell of a lot more complicated. If however the principle that customers should be refunded for the costs involved in migrating from MWEB after they changed their service conditions and defaulted on representations clearly, repeatedly and publicly made then you might also be in luck.
 
Thanks a lot for your quick feedback, Paul. I've been following your progress on the Mweb case with keen interest as I have left Mweb due to them going against their advertisements and policies of "We will never throttle", even while this claim (publicly visible on their Facebook page) was still gaining them clients.

I purchased the new Humble Bundle on Friday and it's quite a lot of Gigs to download. Went to bed about 3am (had friends over) by which time there was no notifications. Planned to sign up with Afrihost this morning, then checked my mail and saw this fiasco...
4Mb Uncapped made quick work between 00:00 and about 11:30 or so when I sat at my PC.

I'd rather put this R1000 toward legal action than pay it for 7Gb of ADSL data which at the most should go at R203. (7Gb x R29).
 
You left a large download to continue through the night into the new month on an account you knew to be only 1 Gb, even checking at 3am when you had a chance to stop the download, and now you complain that this has happened? I find myself unable to summon up much sympathy for you.
 
Advice: pay the money and call it a day.

Your actions are your own mistake. That R1K in legal fees won't last a second.
 
Grouter said:
You left a large download to continue through the night into the new month on an account you knew to be only 1 Gb, even checking at 3am when you had a chance to stop the download, and now you complain that this has happened? I find myself unable to summon up much sympathy for you.
Click to expand...

It's a 1Gb Capped account, since when are there OOB Sharks on ADSL? :confused:

I've had numerous Capped ADSL accounts such as Telkom, Afrihost, WebAfrica and I've never heard of an automated OOB, especially not at this freakish cost. Auto-topup at R29 p/gb at request, yes - but after cancelling the account and being downgraded to 1Gb?

Considering they charge R539 for 4mb "Premium" Uncapped (Which most agree is expensive already), and R29 for 1gb, how is it reasonable to charge R1000 for 7Gb of data? (Of which the first 1Gb was billed at R29)
 
Grouter said:
You left a large download to continue through the night into the new month on an account you knew to be only 1 Gb, even checking at 3am when you had a chance to stop the download, and now you complain that this has happened? I find myself unable to summon up much sympathy for you.
Click to expand...

|tera| said:
Advice: pay the money and call it a day.

Your actions are your own mistake. That R1K in legal fees won't last a second.
Click to expand...

I'm on the OPs side here. If you have a 1GB capped account you shouldn't be able to go over it no matter how hard you try and 20c/MB is just daylight robbery. How can they charge people this in 2013? It really just shows sneaky these b@stards are.
 
DrJohnZoidberg said:
I'm on the OPs side here. If you have a 1GB capped account you shouldn't be able to go over it no matter how hard you try and 20c/MB is just daylight robbery. How can they charge people this in 2013? It really just shows sneaky these b@stards are.
Click to expand...

Search the forum.

It's not the first thread about this and therefore not something that is unknown. The OP should have done a bit of research during August to avoid this problem.
Yes, everyone is peeved at Mweb. I'm not even a customer and I am too at their tactics. Point being, pay the amount due or be indebted, your choice.
 
Conack said:
It's a 1Gb Capped account, since when are there OOB Sharks on ADSL? :confused :)
Click to expand...

When they realised, just like the cell companies, they can legally defraud you and steal your earnings as a last resort to make some extra cash. If the Cell companies can do it why not them?
 
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You should have switched to a new account once you downgraded to 1Gb, if you did this as a "loophole" to switch ISPs while avoiding the last monthly mweb charge.

Pay up, it's your own fault.
No use getting lawyers involved, R1000 is squat, and, you are in the wrong.

If you want to get a lawyer you are going to lose more than R1000, and, you will lose the case, and still need to pay Mweb R1000.
 
Dude have you not been reading the many Mweb threads on here?? The guys on here have been warning each other about this very same thing! However I am not sure there is much you can do about it mate!

Pathetic behaviour on Mwebs part - we really should start up some kind of facebook page or something enlightening people about this kind of behaviour from the various ISPs and SPs etc!
 
Indeed. This account behaviour is apparently on by default without any notice being given to the user.

Can be changed under your ADSL settings in the client panel.
 
I have been reading most of them, and honestly speaking I haven't once seen any mention of anyone being bitten by the OOB Shark.
Come end of the month, if no other avenue opens itself up I'll pay this extortion, but considering that I have several attorney firms as clients (using Mweb on my recommendation as some of them push a lot of data after hours), I'll look into making this fight - their fight. Perhaps they might make the same mistake in downgrading.

What angers me most is that this malpractice is allowed to continue and will catch who knows how many more people. It's disgusting and unethical behaviour by Mweb to enable the OOB shark by default...

Keeping a sharp eye on Paul Hjul, fighting the good fight in the MWEB-Abuse-Notices-Complaint thread.
 
Seen them do this before, MWEB is just a bunch a con artists who prey on people who don't know any better, in fact they are so devious and sneaky even those who do know better get caught out. They are one of the worst companies in this country.
 
BTW., on Telkom Internet, there *used* to be OOB shark, or the possibility thereof.

Why? Because the ADSL regulations state that we may not disconnect you from the internet entirely.

This is a throwback from your (MyADSL's) attempt in 2005 to force Telkom to provide uncapped for the price of a 3GB account, by making (IMHO, underhanded) submissions to ICASA:
-We can't be cut off from the internet or we can't file our taxes
-We can't be cut off from the internet for even a second every day (so the ESR generates a stop and triggers accounting accumulation)
-We can't have any of our traffic shaped because then you may stop us from doing internet banking etc.
(obviously aiming for unshaped, uncapped for the price of 3GB).

But, you didn't think to ask for:
-We can't be post-billed for excess usage
-We can't have our usage reported by interim accounting records at up to hourly levels
-We can't be cut off from the internet (see, you said you needed critical services, and SAIX then developed the LOCAL usage class on SAIX ADSL)

So, Telkom Internet has in the past post-billed users for local-only usage that exceeded 10GB or 30GB "promotional local data" at the then-standard local-only topup rate (something like R15/GB?). Due to the ADSL regulations, we couldn't make this opt-in, you had to opt-out. We ended that (local capping and opt-out post-billed local in excess of the 'promotional free local data') in January this year, as our current solution (soft-capped) to satisfying the ADSL regulations is (in some ways) more user friendly. It could be more user-friendly. We wanted to redirect HTTP traffic to a portal when users reached their cap (as some mobile providers so), to inform them that they were soft-capped and be able to choose other options than being throttled. Unfortunately, regulatory/legal said they weren't prepared to defend our product management team if someone took us to court over the 'you may not cut users off from the local internet' aspect of the ADSL regulations in this event, even if the user just needs to log in and click the 'Submit' button on the default option.

So, you have what you asked for (maybe not what you wanted), and MWEB is complying with the regulations as they are.

If what you wanted in 2004 (before IPC existed) is no longer relevant in 2013, then maybe you guys need to make new submissions to ICASA.

There are ways ISPs could be more creative than at present, features that would be technically easy to implement, but are not possible with the current regulations.
 
I know of someone who had the same thing happen to them with hosting @ Mweb.... R40k in usage.... They took the dragon on and won (out of court)!

/my 2 cents...
 
They dont have to charge R204 per gig out of bundle. that robery.
 
ranger said:
BTW., on Telkom Internet, there *used* to be OOB shark, or the possibility thereof.

Why? Because the ADSL regulations state that we may not disconnect you from the internet entirely.

This is a throwback from your (MyADSL's) attempt in 2005 to force Telkom to provide uncapped for the price of a 3GB account, by making (IMHO, underhanded) submissions to ICASA:
-We can't be cut off from the internet or we can't file our taxes
-We can't be cut off from the internet for even a second every day (so the ESR generates a stop and triggers accounting accumulation)
-We can't have any of our traffic shaped because then you may stop us from doing internet banking etc.
(obviously aiming for unshaped, uncapped for the price of 3GB).

But, you didn't think to ask for:
-We can't be post-billed for excess usage
-We can't have our usage reported by interim accounting records at up to hourly levels
-We can't be cut off from the internet (see, you said you needed critical services, and SAIX then developed the LOCAL usage class on SAIX ADSL)

So, Telkom Internet has in the past post-billed users for local-only usage that exceeded 10GB or 30GB "promotional local data" at the then-standard local-only topup rate (something like R15/GB?). Due to the ADSL regulations, we couldn't make this opt-in, you had to opt-out. We ended that (local capping and opt-out post-billed local in excess of the 'promotional free local data') in January this year, as our current solution (soft-capped) to satisfying the ADSL regulations is (in some ways) more user friendly. It could be more user-friendly. We wanted to redirect HTTP traffic to a portal when users reached their cap (as some mobile providers so), to inform them that they were soft-capped and be able to choose other options than being throttled. Unfortunately, regulatory/legal said they weren't prepared to defend our product management team if someone took us to court over the 'you may not cut users off from the local internet' aspect of the ADSL regulations in this event, even if the user just needs to log in and click the 'Submit' button on the default option.

So, you have what you asked for (maybe not what you wanted), and MWEB is complying with the regulations as they are.

If what you wanted in 2004 (before IPC existed) is no longer relevant in 2013, then maybe you guys need to make new submissions to ICASA.

There are ways ISPs could be more creative than at present, features that would be technically easy to implement, but are not possible with the current regulations.
Click to expand...
Except that there are many other areas where MWEB could be shown not to comply with the regulations - publishing certain information quarterly and what not. There are also contention ratio requirements that then come into issue.

Moreover as you've indicated the regulations go back to 2005 and are overridden by later consumer regulations from ICASA. MWEB would be foolish to go that route - claiming that they were complying with an ICASA set of regulations which ICASA themselves have conceded are not - and cannot be - enforced. Before the CCC they will spend more money on an advocate to defend their case than what the consumers will spend making their life difficult.

Of course the ADSL regulations weren't a total dead weight, they did ensure a minimum DSL speed to be called broadband
 
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