PIPEX Trouble / Advice Needed

[Satako]

Looking for a little bit of advice here…

I’m currently with PIPEX and am on a 1MB package that was available when we signed up around five years ago. A year ago PIPEX updated their packages, offering up to 8MB broadband for the same price that I was paying -- £25. I wasn’t offered an upgrade to this package or even made aware of it through e-mail or post.

Last night, while facing a painful wait for TF2 to download, I started thinking about my broadband speed and why I was still paying £25 for 1MB. Today, I checked the packages on the PIPEX website and saw the offer -- £25 for 8MB broadband.

I compared packages and, aside from a few extra mailboxes, etc, I couldn’t see anything different from the package I was on and the package they were offering – aside from the speed. So, I phoned them up and requested an upgrade to my line speed.

But, alas; no joy.

First of all, the operator told me I would be subject to a new 12 month contract, even after being with them for five years. After explaining to them that my broadband speed wasn’t even as fast as their “mini” package, I was told that it was company policy not to upgrade people without assigning them to a new contract.

I tried calmly to explain that I was never offered an upgrade to this new package, and, furthermore, the price I’m paying for my current package is heavily overpriced. She agreed with this, but, again, said I would not be able to regrade without taking out a 12 month contract. I asked to speak to a team leader but was declined; the excuse being that I would just be told the same thing again.

Now, I don’t think I’m being unreasonable – I’m paying £25 a month for a service that’s not even as good as their £15 one. I just want to be offered a service to match what I’m paying. I didn’t want to go down the road of shouting, moaning or start banging on about how they’re effectively stealing from me every month, but I don’t want to continue paying for this.

I’m happy to leave if it comes down to it, but I’d rather stay. I don’t want another 12 month contract because I’ve already served one and I don’t like being tied down – especially when I feel I’m being penalised for signing up with PIPEX five years ago, before they changed their packages options.

Does anyone have any advice on this? Has anyone else phoned up an ISP to ask for an upgrade to their line or service, and not been told they need a new contract? I was always under the impression that the service is upgraded automatically when it becomes available, putting you on the same level as the packages they currently offer. It’s certainly happened like that with a few of my mates.

I ideally need to know what to say to them when I ring. I’ll move ISP if I have to, but I want to make sure I’ve exhausted all options with PIPEX before I do.

[kandy]

i would move anyway tbh, pipex are ****.

[Bluey]

not had a problem with pipex as such but any company that's got you on a contract like that (my experience with ntl) is that they leave the nuggets out there to temp the new ones but if they can keep you on somethign lower then it's free money for them isn't it.

Out of interest as i'm moving i've noticed toscali are doing a really cheap deal atm the £20 for 8mb and calls one, i've heard they can be bad but is that just the general horror stories you get with any company or just a blanket of badness?

[Jez_Gafys]

Was the same with Easynet. I had a 512kb broadband line and it wasn't tunil I was looking to upgrade to 2mb that I was actually informed that I could upgrade to 1mb for free with the exact same monthly bill but a new 12 month contract would start from the date of installation.

[Baz]

get Be broadband if you can.

[Bluey]

can't, crai

[Shazz]

When monkeys can fly, and pigs rule the world, go for tiscali.

otherwise, steer clear of them.

(this is going to sound rather odd as well now, but...)

Nildram (now owned by tiscali INT, not UK) are superb, i've never really had an issue with them. and they're the only broadband isp i've ever been on

[Damz]

I was having the same issues with Nildram (whoa re now owned by Pipex). I was on an old package (512MB Surf package), it was good enough for what I wanted at the time and the service has always been very good. I moved house and due to distance from the exchange I couldn't upgrade the package so I continued to pay the £23 a month. Over the last couple of years the packages have changed and prices have come down but when I tried to regrade I stumbled across the same sort of issues. I emailed a few people and got crap responses. I could be bothered with effort so changed ISP saving cash and getting a quicker connection.

[bvark]

DSL ISPs get charged for the regrade, so they lock you to a new contract to ensure they'll recover the charge.

You can probably get someone else to waive setup fees on your new connection, so that'd be the best way.

[Elkeeed]

a) why are you so desperate to not be in a contract with them when you have already stuck with them for 5 years in an overpriced deal
b) I would advise against going for any of the 8Mb packages from anyone because they are actually only up to 8Mb and my speeds have actually gone down since I was 'upgraded' from 2Mb to upto 8Mb
c) I'd also shift away from pipex because they are generally a pretty crappy company these days

I've been with eclipse for a long time. They don't use these tactics, whenever a new offer is available they let you know and allow you to upgrade (or downgrade) refunding partial months and so on. And they don't tie you into long contracts either. So these big companies who just shove you through the door like an animal and say everyone does the same are wrong. The only thing I don't like is that they've recently shifted to the ipmax upto 8Mb which is just a crappy product from BT.

[KingDaveRa]

What Elkeeed said.

I suppose it's one of those 'principal of the thing' issues. I was on Zen's 1mb uncapped service, which cost 30 quid a month. They launched their ADSL Max service which was 25 quid a month - albeit capped at 20gb a month.

I've gone through the cap a few times, but otherwise, it HAS worked out better I think. I get around 2mb ish now (I say around... had issues with the line in the past, and my SNR has been forced to 11db, only it's killing my speed). I've had up to 4mb, so I'm trying to get back as close to that as I can.

Also, I'm pretty sure Zen do a single month contract. Their support is ace too. Just phoned, and as I needed to unplug filters and things, the guy at the other end asked for my mobile number, and watched the line until it came back up, then phoned me and we went through all the diagnostics. All of their techies are PROPER techies, and DO know what they're on about. I got a very good explanation of what was going on, and my SNR settings, etc.

The notion of moving to Be is tempting, but I'm pretty sure I would get roughly the same speed, no cap, but have the extra fun of their outsourced support. Also, I'd lose my 8 static IPs, and have to pay MORE for a single IP. Doesn't look like a good deal to me!

[GeeDee]

Move. Pipex aren't worth your time. Really. With the MAC process, it's ridiculously easy to change ADSL ISP these days.

If you're a heavy gamer, check the Multiplay DSL (http://www.multiplaydsl.co.uk) service.

If that doesn't appeal, any of the Entanet resellers will provide a very good service indeed (they all actually re-sell the same product, try here (http://www.adsl24.co.uk) or here (http://www.ukfsn.org)). Enta have invested loads in their service to maintain capacity without having to resort to any kind of traffic shaping and even publish (http://noc.enta.net) the current bandwidth utilisation of each of their BT Centrals.

And failing that too, as has already been said, Zen (http://www.zen.co.uk) are still a good ISP too and Be (https://www.bethere.co.uk/) (if you can get it) are definately worth a look as your best LLU option. :)

IIRC all of the above are on 1 month contracts except Be I think, and Multiplay / Enta (probably Zen too, but i've not checked) are free to migrate in to. So you can always leave again straight away if you want to.

Hope this helps. :)

Giles.

[liv3d]

Satako: Phone & Ask for the upgrade with no 12 month contract, or tell them you want a MAC code, you will be amazed what you can get for free, when you ask for a MAC code :)

Wanadoo (Before Orange tock it over, and yes in the error of my ways) gave me free broadband for 2 months, over Christmas & New Year, instead of giving me a MAC code, then after the 2months I got the MAC code anyway :)

[her0n]

:words:

OH my god. This was my exact situation.

In the end we binned Pipex and moved to BE*. Seriously do it, do not look back. Their 8mb packages are utter tripe, just look online for the reviews.

The 1mb package we were on was fine and was good when we got it, but now it is just expensive compared to what you can get now.

Don't bother staying, move. Demand your MAC code, gogogo.

MOVE. LEAVE.

Have I made myself clear? :p

[Elkeeed]

The only thing about LLU is that once you get unbundled its very hard to swap ISP.

[GeeDee]

True for FMPF suppliers that take your phone service too (Bulldog & TalkTalk), but the rest (Be, Sky / Easynet, Tiscali Wholesale etc) it's just as easy as moving between BTw ISPs* (*usually).

The downside is that it's often not a free migration out. To move a line back to a BTw supplied ISP is charged to the CP the same as a new migration (as the line has to be physically re-jumpered back to BTw kit), so if your ISP charges for activations on clean lines, they will usually charge the same for inbound migrations from LLU SMPF. :)

[her0n]

This is all a bit deja-vu for you eh giles? :P

[GeeDee]

:awesome:

[AdamR]

Goto Zen mate. Free migration from other ISP's. Unmatched service and support quality.

[ez64]

zen
ok one month contracts but 8mbdown and a max of 448kb up which is quite frankly poor with a 50gb cap at 34.99, bit pricey for that speed and any kind of cap these days.

[Narella]

I'm still on Pipex and feel the same. I should really move ISP's, but it's not exactly I'm using the 'net much nowadays.

[Ch3m1c4L]

im still on pipex and still love em.....
8mb adsl max, synced at 7.6mb and get stable downlads of ~850kb, pings are still very low as well. Maybe its because i live in a town full of old people who barely know what the internet is :P

[Satako]

Woah... what an awesome response! :D Cheers all!

I'm going to look into moving. I would have done it sooner but, having not done it for so long, I was still under the impression that there was a lot of downtime and it was next-to-impossible to get the MAC code out of the ISP in question. I guess things have got a lot smoother...

I guess it's a little biased on here but is anyone with MutliplayDSL? I'm interested in the gamer package, even if it's an extra £5 than what I'm paying now. What packages have people chosen on these forums?

Anyway, I'm phoning Pipex tomorrow to tell them to shove it. I'll let you know how I get on. ;)

[Pingman]

This is EXACTLY why i left pipex... :roll:


Saying that, Tiscalli, who i migrated too, are hardly better :(

[GeeDee]

8mbdown and a max of 448kb up which is quite frankly poor with a 50gb cap at 34.99, bit pricey for that speed and any kind of cap these days.

You're a fool if you think that the right thing to do for an ISP is to offer an unlimited service as the industry stands at present.

*ALL* ISPs have usage caps. The better ones are the ones that are upfront about what their networks can sustain. If you'd rather sign up for the 'unlimited usage' (Fair usage policy applies) deal where the ISP doesn't publish any firm details, just that 'We operate a fair usage policy, you probably won't be affected by it' notice and who then send you threatening letters for breaking the fair usage policy they refuse to publish firm details on in the first place then go right ahead - but I won't be doing so. Or there's the ISPs who offer BT IPstream (or even worse Datastream) based services for sub £15 per month and cram everyone onto seriously overloaded pipes as a result. Users of these ISPs often report sub 512k speeds on their "up to 8mb" connections and don't even get me started on trying to get 'support' from a lot of them.

The simple fact of the matter is that the cost of bandwidth between the EU premises and the ISPs network is VERY high. It needs to be paid for and the ISP isn't going to run at a loss for ever now are they. Assuming your ISP is BTw based, *1* m/bit of bandwidth from your house to their network is going to cost them at minimum £200 per month, and that's before you take off the £8 tail fees per month and then the cost of providing the rest of the network on to the internet, paying staff, providing support and making a profit. You tell me how many people need to pay their £15 for 8m/bit in order to pay for this. :)

And before anyone starts harping on about the wonderful LLU providers, the only reason ISPs like be are able to charge what they do at present is because takeup of their services has been very low so far and so they have a lot of spare capacity right now (which they might as well use). I'll be watching with interest to see what happens once o2 start actually pushing customers towards the ISP they bought. Yes LLU is cheaper for the ISP, but not massively so. You only need to look at the levels that LLU ISPs such as TalkTalk are loading their services up to already to see what can happen and realise LLU isn't the answer to everyones problems, it's just another way of provisioning lines.

£35 for 50gb from Zen is reasonable enough - after all, you get what you pay for and you're paying for a very good support team and a network not groaning under ridiculous load with Zen. Personally i'd like to see some more generous off peak allowances in addition to that 50gb much as enta offer (perhaps zen do this? i've not checked), but it clearly suits just fine for lots of people. You get what you pay for is certainly true for broadband connectivity. :)

[Nokl]

Not because of this post in any way, but today iv been given my mac code (emailed on monday) from pipex and migrating to Be. There were no question or no offers, they just told me the code. Was pretty easy, but I have been consistently going over my 15gig cap since upgrading to 8mg last year and from what Baz has told me, are alot less likely to want to make you stay if your a heavy downloader.

Something to do with top 5% of an ISP's bandwidth users, costing the them about 80% of their bandwidth

anyway anybody still with pipex, get the hell out!!

[GeeDee]

I was still under the impression that there was a lot of downtime and it was next-to-impossible to get the MAC code out of the ISP in question. I guess things have got a lot smoother...

Pipex are *required* to give you a MAC within 5 days of you requesting it. They are not allowed to withhold it, regardless of any contract periods you might be in or money you might owe. One of the more sensible rules Ofcom have imposed. :)

There's no downtime using the MAC process. Your new ISP will give you a date when the migration will complete. On that date your old service will stop working, you then just update your modem / router with the new login details for the new ISP and you'll be away.

Anyway, I'm phoning Pipex tomorrow to tell them to shove it. I'll let you know how I get on. ;)

A word of advice - make sure you DON'T ask them to cancel your service. You want to ask for a MAC code and not to cancel. Cancelling to an ISP means putting a cease on the ADSL, which means you'd have to 1: Wait for the service to stop before you could re-order from anyone else (downtime) and 2: You'd be subject to new activation fees if your new ISP charged for activation instead of just migrating in (usually) for free with a MAC code.

[ez64]

be there do have fair usage but ive never had a problem with 35-65gb monthly on 20mb llu (but that will probably change if LLU gets oversubscribed as well)

I would like the support zen or nildram offer and its never good going with companys that cheap out on this but I want speed, I want it now and without any sort of cap or fair usage and I would pay £100 a month for that.

of course its not a good idea but if we as users dont ask for more bandwith and speed we will never see this infastructure upgraded in the next 10 years.

with the way e commerce has gone I dont see why the uk hasnt moved as far forward as quite a few countrys have.

I spose its better than dialup,.

[GeeDee]

And before anyone starts harping on about the wonderful LLU providers, the only reason ISPs like be are able to charge what they do at present is because takeup of their services has been very low so far and so they have a lot of spare capacity right now (which they might as well use). I'll be watching with interest to see what happens once o2 start actually pushing customers towards the ISP they bought.

I'll just quote myself. :)

Be is a very good ISP at present; but takeup of their service has been very low. They've invested shed loads in unbundling a lot of exchanges and have a lot of spare capacity. Once o2 start pushing them, you can expect to notice contention I would imagine.

[bvark]

And before anyone starts harping on about the wonderful LLU providers, the only reason ISPs like be are able to charge what they do at present is because takeup of their services has been very low so far and so they have a lot of spare capacity right now (which they might as well use).

The situation where LLU providers have had significant overcapacity has persisted since 2003, and given the last subscriber growth figures on the Be, former Easynet and former Bulldog LLU networks, all three networks have some considerable way to go before they're full - none of them have even deployed DPI yet on their LLU estate.

The costs for IPStream are considerably below £200/Mbit now, and WBC could see the capacity element fall to ~£70/Mbit, so I'm imagining a lot of the people offering "unsustainable" caps or "unlimited" offers are looking at the tradeoff between subscriber loss by oversubscription vs the cost of acquiring new subscribers, knowing a lot of it will be fixed in 12-18 months by lower wholesale pricing.

Ultimately, though, whether an ISP has a sustainable business model or not is of little interest to the end-user, so "LLU - if you can, you should" remains my advice, given you can always MAC to a "safe" choice if you need to.

[GeeDee]

Do the likes of CPW / TalkTalk really have spare capacity? If they do they sure have a funny way of managing it going by a lot of user reports.

I didn't realise IPStream was much below £200. The pricing i've seen is based on the ~£1.5m / 622 / 12 maths, which as far as I was aware is still pretty accurate. Tail fees dropped slightly didn't they, and activation has been reduced (but cessation charges introduced) but I thought central pricing had barely dropped at all.

Ultimately, though, whether an ISP has a sustainable business model or not is of little interest to the end-user, so "LLU - if you can, you should" remains my advice, given you can always MAC to a "safe" choice if you need to.

Absolutely, and if I had the choice i'd be on be's service - but I really don't think that BTw based ISPs offering 'unlimited' that really isn't are helping the industry as a whole at all and if you want a good service from a BTw provisoned line, an ISP advertising unlimited is usually one to avoid. :)

[ez64]

agreed

[kandy]

You're a fool if you think that the right thing to do for an ISP is to offer an unlimited service as the industry stands at present.

*ALL* ISPs have usage caps. The better ones are the ones that are upfront about what their networks can sustain.

Thats bang on, I am very happy with my current ISP who are upfront with an 80GB/month cap, in return for me not going over this they give me an excellent low latency non traffic shaped connection. I've only ever gone over this once in a year and only by a couple of GB due to dux0r downloading man pr0n.

It's quite shocking to read about your costs from BT and what you are getting charged on your centrals, I left the ISP arena just as DSL trials were starting and at that time we quite happily had racks full of HiperArcs and Portmasters putting literally thousands of 56k'ers down a single 155Mbit/s :p

[Zenith]

GeeDee was spot on about the Entanet resellers before. I've been with Aquiss [www.aquiss.net] over a year and I'm very happy with them.
Reasons I like them so much...
One month contract.
A variety of packages to suit your usage profile and pocket.
Excellent customer service.
UP FRONT bandwidth allowances.
A variety of methods of payment.
No port throttling *
* You never get throttled on ports, but there is a system to prevent packet loss at peak times. The effect is that your maximum speed may get reduced during times of congestion. It always bounces back up again an hour or so later. This is Entanet doing it upsteam, not the ISP. Check http://noc.enta.net for the status page.

Sorry about the pimpage. :)

[Satako]

Sorry about the pimpage. :)Heh, don't be. I've just checked out their website and that looks like a very attractive package indeed, compared to Zen at least.

[Lucifa]

GeeDee was spot on about the Entanet resellers before. I've been with Aquiss [www.aquiss.net] over a year and I'm very happy with them.
Reasons I like them so much...
One month contract.
A variety of packages to suit your usage profile and pocket.
Excellent customer service.
UP FRONT bandwidth allowances.
A variety of methods of payment.
No port throttling *
* You never get throttled on ports, but there is a system to prevent packet loss at peak times. The effect is that your maximum speed may get reduced during times of congestion. It always bounces back up again an hour or so later. This is Entanet doing it upsteam, not the ISP. Check http://noc.enta.net for the status page.

Sorry about the pimpage. :)

I'm with these guys and have been for around a year now.

You can choose your cap package, so if you are happy to pay more you get a bigger cap (plus they have a generous offpeak cap to go with it) and you can check your usage online.
Some would consider them a bit pricey, but you definitely get what you pay for.

[bvark]

Do the likes of CPW / TalkTalk really have spare capacity? If they do they sure have a funny way of managing it going by a lot of user reports.

I didn't include them as they've only got ~20Mbps throttled pipes to most exchanges, and they're clearly in the "pile high, flog cheap" LLU (along with Tiscali's LLU).

I didn't realise IPStream was much below £200. The pricing i've seen is based on the ~£1.5m / 622 / 12 maths, which as far as I was aware is still pretty accurate. Tail fees dropped slightly didn't they, and activation has been reduced (but cessation charges introduced) but I thought central pricing had barely dropped at all.

Annual rental is now £1162K, so it's £155/mbit (http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/3041-bt-wholesale-confirms-may-price-changes.html). It is somewhat cancelled out by per subscriber charges, though, depending on your 622 fill rate.

[Joey]

I got a letter through from Pipex this week

Pipex sold its consumer operating division to Tiscali

I left Pipex because they were bad BEFORE this move, and I'm so glad I did

[Afty]

Yup - I'm leaving PIPEX soon aswell. Their idea of customer service would make Idi Amin proud.

[KingDaveRa]

I have to agree with the comments about Zen being a wee bit expensive. They are, but then as I've said, their support is second-to-none, so I suppose you gets what you pay for.

Cheap does not always equal best value.

[AdamR]

Zen also seem to be good at making BT do things when they are required to.

Anyway, something you might like to read (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7001413.stm).