Pictured: The UK internet in its uphill battle for improvement.

This particular feather in the cap marries technology and politics: It’s no great discovery and it’s hardly rocket-science: In fact it’s glaringly obvious. However, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: The British internet infrastructure is a fiasco. This time I have the backing of Ofcom; the UK telecoms regulator:-

A survey carried out for Ofcom indicated that the average UK customer typically gets only around 45% of the broadband speed advertised by their ISP that they’re paying for: Rip-off Britain in action. What do the ISP’s intend to do about it? As usual as little as possible: As long as the cash is coming in they’ll do their utmost to provide the minimum which they can get away with: i.e. Faster than dialup … Because they can’t possibly get away with anything less.

Researchers did 10 million tests in 1,500 homes in the UK over a period of 30 days. They found, not only that broadband speeds in rural areas were up to 15% less than those in urban environments, but also that the typical internet speed was an average of 3.6 Mb/s (Megabits per second.), despite the fact that the usual broadband speed currently advertised in the UK is 8Mb/s or more.

BT advertise 8Mb/s over their copper-wire telephone network, and Virgin Media advertise 20Mb/s over their fibre-optic network.

I’m a BT customer who lives within a few minutes walk of the BT exchange. A few years ago I was told that my internet speed was being increased from 2Mb/s to 8Mb/s for no extra charge. The 2Mb/s speed barely reached 1.5 Mb/s normally; and proportionally speaking the 8Mb/s service hardly ever gets above 6Mb/s. It’s normally at around 3 Mb/s. In fact, over the Christmas period last year (2008) it dropped to just below 1Mb/s.

That’s rip-off Britain for you: ‘Take all your wealth from you and give you shit in return.

It’s quite abysmal also that Virgin Media’s fibre-optic service; advertised at 20Mb/s, rarely gets up to a paltry 10Mb/s in most areas.

Having said that; when the faster service was first switched on; I clocked speeds of up to 7.3 Mb/s. This was short-lived, though. In addition to that my existing modem provided by BT was unable to cope with the faster internet and kept disconnecting until it eventually no longer worked at all. BT’s partially-English speaking Indian call-centre weren’t having any of it, and the person I had the displeasure of talking with gave me such grief that I ended up testing every bit of cable from my BT socket as well as the socket itself, through to my modem, then the patch lead from my modem to the computer. I then replaced the ADSL filter and still no internet. The Indian fascist on the other end of the phone told me that my computer was faulty and that I’d have to return it to the manufacturer. I informed him that I was the manufacturer, and that the line and modem didn’t work on any of my other computers either. I also informed him that he was a scare-mongering ignorant tele-thug who had no place in a call centre. I demanded to speak to his supervisor, who, it turned out, couldn’t understand a word of English. Eventually, after I managed to get to speak to someone who was a little more fluent, they agreed to send me a modem that was capable of handling the increased speed.

As I said in the past; BT is a rather reliable ISP; but when things do go wrong they’re hell to deal with.

As is the case with myself, millions of other internet customers are getting less than half the broadband speed they are paying for, restricting their ability to download music, film and games. It’s the stupid British people’s fault just as much as the ISP’s: They just grin and bear it; not daring to complain. I’ve complained about it before; but just got myself branded as a trouble-maker by BT and was ignored.

Here’s something: the download speed meter which is part of the BT Online Help software which they give you with their service, along with free Norton Security Centre (An outdated version.) and other useless bloatware, all of which I wouldn’t use even if they offered to pay me to use it, has a few lines of unchanging text underneath it, which says something to the effect of: -

"This speed is judged to be acceptable by BT for your connection, bearing in mind the time of day and the distance of your property from the BT exchange. Although BT do advertise a certain download speed, we are unable to maintain this at all times. Factors that can affect the speed of your connection include the distance of your computer from the telephone socket, the distance of your place of residence from the exchange, as well as the number of users currently using our services."

…And my age, the position of the sun relative to the galactic core, in addition to the effect of Jupiter’s gravitational pull on the Earth no doubt.

This message appears no matter what the download speed: I’d still get exactly the same message if it was 1 byte a year. It’s just another cop-out from BT.

There is something to do with the speeds pertaining to the time of day though: In the tests that were run; speeds were lowest between 5pm and 6pm on Sundays, when internet usage is at its peak. – Can’t you just hear the infrastructure creaking under the weight put upon it? Don’t you smell the stench of melting insulation as the copper wires heat up?!

…And still the politicians are talking about doing something about it in a future tense. UK businesses such as BT are holding back on doing anything about it until they can be sure that they’ll make instant vast profits.

David Cameron, leader of the Opposition, says "Elect the Tories at the next election and we’ll do something about it."

Meanwhile Gordon Brown is still thinking about doing something about it. Perhaps he’ll say: -

"No; elect the Labour Party at the next election and we’ll do even more about it."

…And then have a round of meetings to discuss it for another four years if he gets elected?

Don Foster, the Liberal Democrat culture, media and sport spokesman, said:

“This is yet more evidence that broadband providers are ripping off British consumers.”

– Quite obviously not much gets past him!

Jeremy Hunt, – which rhymes with "front", and "runt", – the Shadow Culture Secretary, is expected to voice his criticism today. In a speech to be delivered at Microsoft’s London offices, he will say:-

“The UK has some of the slowest broadband speeds in the developed world, coming 21st out of 30 countries in a survey by the US-based Information Technology & Innovation Foundation.” 

- To which Microsoft will probably quite rightly reply "If you can’t maintain your own country that you’re supposed to be looking after; we’re not going to do it for you. Sod off!"

The song lyrics "A little less conversation – A little more action" spring to mind.

One thing is that if we keep talking about it long enough we’ll eventually no doubt be welcomed warmly into the third-world; where we can learn to communicate by means of bongo-drums instead.

"That’s almost up to 30 kilobytes a second so far!"

British Telecommunications (BT) appear to have a good and fairly reliable standard of service with respect to their technology and technological services; such as internet, telephone, and the other technologies that they cover. I find that it’s pretty solid, made of sturdy stuff, and things rarely go wrong.

When they do go wrong, though, the flaws start to show. I’ve mentioned this a few times before, and I feel that it’s a subject that I should cover again, as despite my earlier posts, as well as the public’s experiences with their appalling customer-services regarding their foreign call-centres, combined with my reporting them for dodgy advertising practices and awful customer relations practices, nothing seems to have changed: They just nonchalantly carry on regardless.

Whenever I ring BT for whatever reason I get stress. They usually pass me around departments; each one of which interrogates me with the same stet spiel before passing me on to the next. Most are in India and I have to say everything in triplicate before they understand me anyway. As a bonus they appear to have been trained to think that no BT customer is intelligent enough to use a word of more than 2 syllables or to have any idea whatsoever of using a computer. When I do finally get through to the right department, I usually find that I’m talking to a fairly young Indian girl with an extremely strong Indian accent who appears to think she knows everything there is to know about everything, talks down to me in a patronising manner – slowly as if I was retarded – avoiding using technical terms, and despite my indicating that I build computers and install software + have qualifications in analogue and digital electronics, treating me as if I was a technophobe with an IQ of 10. If I ask to talk to her supervisor it takes about 10 minutes to get her supervisor on the line after 5 minutes of requesting; only for the supervisor to read from the same script that was earlier read to me, and tell me that she can’t help me any further than she already has, but if I’d like to pursue the matter further I should ring another of BT’s trillions of departments, (Probably in a room next door, or at the back of the call-centre in India.) on such-and-such a number. (When I do I find that I’m told that I’m speaking to the wrong department, and after being transferred through another X departments – undergoing identification interrogation at each of them, I find I end up speaking to the same Indian girl who offers to put me on hold while she transfers me yet again; after which the line goes dead.

Right BT: I’ve had enough. – As have millions of others who’ve switched their telephone service and/or ISP to another provider.

- They’re crafty bleeders too: Every time I phone them to get a better deal from them, (I must admit that they can be bargained and bartered with, and that’s a good thing. – But they’ll only drop a certain amount: If you push them too far they’ll just end the call.) I end up signing a 12 or 18-month contract in order to get what I want. That means that I spend over half the time tied to them.

A bit more on bartering with BT: If you feel that you’re not getting a fair deal, and/or you know that you can get a better deal elsewhere as regards price; ring their sales department – Which is at least partially located in the UK, ask to speak to someone in authority, and tell them exactly why you think you’re not getting a good deal from them.

Don’t lie: They may be incompetent but they’re not stupid. If you lie they’ll just politely tell you that they are unable to help you and end the call. Be honest with them and they’ll hopefully be fair with you. I can almost guarantee that they’ll tie you into a contract; but don’t be put off by that: If you’re properly self-aware then you’ll be able to negotiate further deals whilst under contract on the basis that you renew your contract for a full-term.

Snide Ba—rds!

OK back to the point: BT; you are getting to a point where you are going to shoot yourself in the foot if you squeeze any harder: That thing which you’re squeezing has become a trigger which will lead to your eventual self-destruction in the present economic climate. Either get your act together or prepare to slowly and tortuously go under.

I feel that the only reason why anyone would use BT’s internet services is because they’re less fault-prone than anyone else’s: That’s the positive side to them. They work and they work properly 99.99% of the time. – However, aside from their abysmal PR efforts, BT are rather expensive, also they’re neither the fastest ISP in the UK, nor are they future-proofed at the present moment. In fact Virgin Media are beginning to appear a nicer and nicer alternative as time goes by.

Virgin Media aren’t quite as reliable as BT in my opinion: They have got a lot better in this respect though, and they continue to do so. To anyone in a cabled area who’s thinking of changing ISP; I suggest Virgin Media as one of the best options. As for those in a non-cabled area; I suggest Virgin Media or BT – BT being the most reliable of the two for now, as two of the best options; whereas Virgin Media will probably have more chance of being the better of the two in the future. The choice is yours out of the two.

There is a single lower-cost provider who I would recommend to the same, even in some cases to a greater, extent than either of these two, though. More on that further down.

Other ISPs?

Other ISPs? Well I’m not too bothered about most other ISPs as far as landline communications are concerned. Mobile communications are a different matter and are outside the scope of this article. Most other ISPs probably use BT or Virgin Media’s equipment to carry their data, and probably buy up spare capacity in wholesale amounts; hence their pricing policies being discounted in some way. When something goes wrong, though, they have to check their own equipment first -The delay caused at this point can be anything between immediately and eternally. Following that, if they can’t find a fault, they have to ask their providers to check if there are any faults on the carrier equipment, which is requested but usually goes to the back of the queue. Some parts of some cheaper networks have been known to be down for weeks at a time in the past. – If you pay peanuts you get the services of monkeys.

BUT…

There is one that is cheap-er than BT, but is pretty reliable: That being the Utility Warehouse, who actually own a percentage of the network that they use, in addition to purchasing spare-capacity from other carriers. – Which is why I advertise them on this site. A FTSE-listed company that can win an award from Which? magazine must be worth considering as an option. I’ll say no more; but why not click on the ad and find out more about them? They’re a UK-only service currently, so I hope I haven’t wasted your time if you live outside the UK.

If there’s anything you’d like to add, contradict, or express an opinion on, then please do comment.

BT have messed up again! I tried to access this website via the normal ftp channel that I use to upload and download files, and the server returned an invalid address error. I checked my ftp settings on my Fasthosts account, which were correct; but still got the same result. I uninstalled and reinstalled my ftp client, FileZilla, inputted the correct settings – same result. I downloaded WS-FTP-LE , set it up, and got the same result with that too. I phoned Fasthosts who said that all BT customers had exactly the same problem since BT had introduced new  measures to combat spam and illegal downloading via P2P earlier.

What that means is that BT have introduced a new piece of equipment into the loop that looks for anything it doesn’t like and blocks it. It saw my ftp, which it passed to the server, the server responded but the BT equipment saw the response and blocked it. My ftp client didn’t get a response and assumed that there wasn’t one; hence its response.

This is all connected with this stupid illegal unworkable UK government initiative to kerb illegal downloads that I reported on earlier. http://kkomp.com/archives/629 I asked how long did they think it would take for the problem to be remedied. They said it should only take a few hours, that they were kicking and screaming at BT, and that BT had assigned some of their top technicians to the case.

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2 Hours later I phoned BT : After following through several stages of a complicated menu I was played the message

“Welcome to BT broadband…we’re closed…” in short. “…For faults only please ring…” I did.; I endured the boring drivel about how BT record all phone calls and that if I had a problem with the internet service I could visit their website…A bit like saying

“If your car won’t start why not drive round to our garage and we’ll have it fixed in no time at all.”

“…please phone 0800…” was the message before the phone went dead: I redialed again and endured the same drivellous messages before…

“Om-put-put-ding-ding saab. Welcomming to BT. Please be to how may I help you. Can I have your name and the first line of your address please thank you?”

Yes hello Ranjeet – Here we go again. I gave my name etc – Yes I am the account holder. (Stupid question to ask: “Are you the account holder? Why not just look at the details on your screen when you bring up the account?)

“I’m having problems with using ftp over the internet and am unable to access my server at my web-host.” I continued. “BT are aware of this matter and are working to resolve it. Would you tell me how much longer you expect the matter to take until it’s resolved please.”

“You can’t access the internet?” Came the reply.

I think I used the word pillock in what I said next before I repeated myself.

“It is a problem with your server.” Said the Indian

(I’ve edited out the next few lines to make this blog fit for publication.)

“I will find out for you. Please to be holding the line. What is ftp?”

“File Transfer Protocol” I replied; amazed at the lack of knowledge. “I thought you were trained? This is a technical helpline isn’t it? – It bloody well better be as it’s the only one that’s open!”

“I will find out for you.”

The line went silent for a while and then was hung up.

“‘Cheeky f—ing bleeders!” I hit the roof.

To cut a long story short; after partly-demolishing a door that I didn’t like, I went through all that again to be told by a very gently-mannered Indian woman that nobody had a clue as nobody had been informed of it.

“Fair comment.” I thought; thanked her for her time, and rang the BT Broadband Status line, which told me that there were no problems at all with BT Broadband. I tried to connect via ftp again and got the same result. I phoned Fasthosts again, who confirmed that BT were fully informed and working on it.

- An ISP that lies; both by telephone message and by half-baked computer-illiterate representative. An ISP that neglects to inform its staff of major issues so that they can be of any help to its customers. An ISP that promises a service and ruins the experience of that service for its customers; then lies about it, and keeps everyone in the dark.

You’re wondering “Since you’ve had all this trouble with BT lately; why don’t you change ISP?”

I’d love to; but they give me material for my blog as part of their excuse for a service, so it can’t be all bad.

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BEWARNED: BT’s new Home Hub could cost you nearly twice as much as advertised as an existing BT customer; and you won’t know that you have to pay extra until after you receive the unit:-

Home Hub v2.0, released in July 2008

Last week I was looking at the BT website and I noticed that they had brought out a new model of the BT Home Hub router – a version 2.0. http://www.frequencycast.co.uk/homehub2.html It had a stylish curved polished black plastic design and 4 ethernet ports. I decided that I was going to have one, as the one I was currently using was white which clashed with the colour of the rest of my equipment, was chunky and fairly ugly in comparison, and I was using both ethernet ports out of the 2 available and would prefer an additional 2 ports for future expansion.

I rang BT and eventually managed to get the Indian at the other end of the phone to understand what I was saying and take my order. He said that I’d have to pay £44.99 for it, (About $90USD) which I thought was fair (That was half-price as an existing BT customer.): I’d had the existing BT Home Hub (V.1.1) free with the full package including VOIP phone, unlimited bandwidth, and their biggest and most expensive residential phone package. The VOIP phone uses a separate BT telephone number on the same line, and was channeled over the internet from the BT exchange; thus the cost of calls was allegedly cheaper. (As well as worse quality.)

(*Note: The recent BT Home Hubs; 2.0 and above, require a working voltage of 15 Volts. The older BT Home Hubs, before 2.0 require a working voltage of 9 Volts: Therefore if you’re replacing an old Home Hub with a new 2.0 or greater, you would probably have problems with it, if it works at all, if you don’t use the power adapter supplied with it and use the old one instead. (I don’t advise using the new adapter with an old Home Hub; although it may or may not work as a temporary measure. (Then again it might damage the old Home Hub due to over-voltage – I don’t know and I don’t intend to experiment in this area.)))

Today I received delivery of my new BT Home Hub; exactly as described in their advertising material. It was a snitch to set up; the only thing I had to do really was replace the old mains power adapter with the supplied adapter; as the new hub ran on a voltage of 15 Volts, whereas the old one ran on 9 Volts. I already had the required software installed, (I don’t use their free Norton security software as it’s ineffective resource-hogging crap. I only use the BT Desktop Help software.) and it picked up and worked a dream. I then realised that I hadn’t attached the VOIP handset’s cradle or configured it to work with my existing handset. The existing handset was white – Hmm; a new one would cost me so I decided I’d live with it until I had enough spare balance to buy a new black one.

I removed the cover from the cradle socket on the new hub and it suddenly hit me that there was no way that my old cradle was going to fit. I checked the package for a new cradle but none was supplied. I phoned BT. :

The Indian went all through the most stringent interrogation for identity verification; and then said he’d transfer me to the relevant department; who did it again. This time I was talking at last to a Brit – Yippee!.. But my happiness was short-lived:

The reply was that they don’t supply a new cradle separately; and that I’d have to buy one along with a new handset for £35.99 (About $70USD)> I said that this was a con: I already had a perfectly good handset; all I needed was a cradle which should have been supplied with the new hub: I’d like a free cradle by itself or I’d be taking the matter to the Office of Fair Trading. I’d also like BT to make it clear in their advertising that the new router would require a new cradle and handset BEFORE the customer chose to buy it; or I’d be taking that matter to Trading Standards as well.

To cut a long story short she wouldn’t budge; so rightly or wrongly I went ahead and ordered and told her that I’d be referring the matter to the relevant powers that be – Which I’m about to do.

If you’re a BT customer and you’d like a new BT Home Hub 2.0 with a usable cradle and phone included; the cost isn’t £44.99: That’s a con – You can’t use your existing handset as the cradle won’t fit. The true cost in total is £80.00 approximately. (Somewhere around $160USD.)

Another example of Bullshit Telecom’s dishonesty and unethical advertising.

They WILL be sorry: I’ll make sure of it!

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