t-mobile fair usage policy on their mobile broadband

[Jim and Paula]

Just for info........

 

Just went over our t-mobile broadband ‘fair usage’ allocation today…..first time in three years.

I downloaded the latest version of Ubuntu, the download failed just before completion so I downloaded again which took me over my allowance.

 

Got a message from t-mobile to inform me that I have exceeded the ‘fair usage’ allowance of 3GB per month and am now limited/restricted to web browsing only (no downloads, FTP, watching video etc.) between the hours of 16:00 and midnight. They say that everything will work as normal between midnight and 16:00.

 

I am not complaining, all in all, I think it is a very fair system. I would rather this than be charged for broadband unexpectedly.

 

My 3GB allowance will start again at the beginning of the next calendar month (next Thursday), even though my billing date runs from the 28th of the month – I do find this a bit strange as I thought it would have been based around my contract/billing date.

 

Edited to add link to t-mobile message:

 

http://www.nb-anon.com/cwf/t-mobile.html

Edited September 27, 2009 by Jim and Paula

[twocvbloke]

There was something on the news recently about ISPs and their fair-use policies, saying that they are unfair in the way that they limit user's browsing even if it was innocently downloading an Ubuntu CD/DVD...

 

I've downloaded an Ubuntu Server CD via my stick, but as I shelled out for the £25/7GB allowance, I think that a CD is fair use to me...

 

It's time the ISPs opened the flood(lock)gates and let their customers through to the www, cos there''l be uproar if they don't, cos for the likes of VirginMedia and their Fibre-op 50Meg speeds and nowhere to browse cos of "fair use policies", there'll be a lot of annoyed people paying for what they're not getting!!!

 

 

 

 

Rant over...

[Justme]

Thats better than Three's policy of charging you £1 per Mb WITHOUT telling you that you have used up all your allowance. They keep doing that till you hit your credit limit (normally £50) & then cut you off.

[casper ghost]

T mobile contacted me to advise that I had used 3/4 of my usage so was near to the limit, this was half way through the month. It allowed me to limit usage to stay within the limit, so not going over. Seemed fair to me.

[twocvbloke]

Thats better than Three's policy of charging you £1 per Mb WITHOUT telling you that you have used up all your allowance. They keep doing that till you hit your credit limit (normally £50) & then cut you off.

 

They do send you a text to your stick to tell you your credit is low, but if you're on PAYG, it's 30p/MB, contract though I don't know cos I hate contracts...

[casper ghost]

They do send you a text to your stick to tell you your credit is low, but if you're on PAYG, it's 30p/MB, contract though I don't know cos I hate contracts...

 

15 pound per month on mobile contract, which included a free notebook.

(managed to load pics ok now, been through memory and deleted loads of unused rubbish, have to close all progrms before doing it)

[Lady Muck]

Vodafone only contact you and ask you to limit it if you 'take the p*ss' more than once. We've gone over a couple of times, but never been charged and never had our knuckles rapped.

It's one of the reasons I stick with them - they're not the cheapest but I like their service.

 

ETA: does your dongle software not have a meter which you set to show you how close to your limit you are getting? Ours does.

Edited September 28, 2009 by Lady Muck

[Justme]

They do send you a text to your stick to tell you your credit is low,

 

We use the stick shared via a router so dont get the MMS messages. We have asked them to message us to a dif number but they refuse. They do however use other numbers & email to contact us about other stuff. We were on the 3gig pack but have upgraded to the 15gb pack. At our speed its would be very hard to do more than that unless downloading films / progs every day.

[Berty]

Vodafone only contact you and ask you to limit it if you 'take the p*ss' more than once. We've gone over a couple of times

 

Rant:

 

How do they get away with advertising unlimited broadband, then stick you with a fair usage policy? Either it is unlimited, or it isn't!

 

I'm heartened by the mention of t mobile though, cos they've offered me a 10 pounds per month contract with 3gb limit. It sounds like their handling of the limit is eminently reasonable.

 

Cheers,

Berty

[Lady Muck]

Thing is, even in a house it's not limited is it?

 

We went on a big usenet download binge when we were in Yorks this summer.

 

<Wonders if mother has had complaints from Sky?>

[Berty]

Thing is, even in a house it's not limited is it?

 

We went on a big usenet download binge when we were in Yorks this summer.

 

<Wonders if mother has had complaints from Sky?>

 

Yep!

 

I was with eclipse (when I had a land line). Their "unlimited" service was massively throttled at peak hours, and not very fast out of peak hours. They never said what capacity they considered fair use, and I was on the cheapest tarrif so it was what I expected.

 

It was *definitely* subject to limits, and *definitely* advertised as an "unlimited" service!

 

The opening poster in this thread described the download rate limits imposed on them when they went over a 3GB policy. This in a service advertised as unlimited.

 

It's like having an all you can eat buffet, in which someone watches how much you are eating, and when they decide you've had enough, they come along and only let you eat one mouthful of food every 5 minutes!

 

Sorry, I did warn you it was rant

 

Cheer,

Berty

[mayalld]

Rant:

 

How do they get away with advertising unlimited broadband, then stick you with a fair usage policy? Either it is unlimited, or it isn't!

 

The ASA said they could tell lies.

[WotEver]

How do they get away with advertising unlimited broadband, then stick you with a fair usage policy? Either it is unlimited, or it isn't!

 

A certain TV show with which I'm associated started a campaign about that very question last year. They encouraged everyone to write to their ISP asking the exact same question.

 

If I recall correctly the campaign was largely successful with Virgin being the first to say they'd be stopping the practice, swiftly followed by their nemesis Sky, with all the other ISPs muttering in the background "Oh, I guess we'll have to stop it too." However my memory is never that safe a thing, so don't take my word for it.

 

The online link to that campaign (and others) is here: http://fwd.five.tv/gadget-show/videos/campaigns but beware - if you click on any of the video links you might approach your download limit!

 

Basically the purpose of this post is to say that if you have a contract that states "Unlimited" anywhere in the wording, but then gives a "Fair usage" caveat, write to your ISP and ask them to justify how a cap can be applied to something which by definition is "without limits". In this instance, people power appears to be working.

 

Cheers,

Tony