Fibre Speed not Accurate to within +/- 1Mbit)

[#1]

The ten day thing has always been completely misinterpreted on ADSLx. See this debunking which explains what actually happens. Made even more irrelevant on FTTC as the MSR and FTR are called something else and have completely different values, not generated from the actual connection speed.
Unfortunately Plusnet (and every other BT Wholesale using ISP) are powerless in the matter as they buy the service from BT Wholesale, who apparently will not listen.  The persistence of the myth for so many years within BT Wholesale is simply staggering. As can be seen from a quote earlier, even with the very recent revision of the Wholesale line checker they persist in it.
The 2-day Openreach period may perhaps also have been misunderstood from the SIN, as a recent poster somewhere suggested what it really means is that it won't normally intervene on day one unless the instability is really bad. I used to think it was a formal 2-day very sensitive time, but I tend to accept this newer view.
Re the "accurate to within +/- 1Mbps", I agree that is silly and should be removed. I think it only came in recently, and someone tried to be too clever.  But the poster(s?) going on about advertising standards and legality I feel are a bit OTT. We just all need to point out that it shouldn't be there, and hope to get it removed.
Which brings me to the main point of the thread, the 34.02Mbps IP Profile. I think a new Reply might be best to completely separate the issues.
Edit - Final line above changed from 37Mbps connection to 34.02 IP Profile.

[#2]

The 34.01Mbps IP Profile indicates a connection speed of ~35.15Mbps, way below the estimated 40Mbps. The 37Mbps Current line speed setting in the OP's Member Centre I believe to be a "special case" setting for a line expected to connect at 40Mbps.
I suggest powering off the modem for a couple of minutes, as only by doing a disconnection and reconnection can the connection speed change. I feel a power down is better than just turning it off using the button on the back.
A BT (diagnostic option) speed test is then needed to check the new IP Profile. Divide that by 0.9679 to get the approximate connection speed, as I did above.
If there is no substantial improvement, then a factory reset of the modem after a couple of hours might be an idea. (The delay is so as not to upset the DLM).
If that fails to help as well, then as Bob Pullen said three days ago that's a very big divergence from the estimate. I'd be raising a ticket and posting its number in this thread.
And by the way, there are two DLMs operating on FTTC. The Openreach one controlling the line connection itself, and the BT Wholesale one setting the IP Profile from the sync speeds it is told by the Openreach one when a PPP session is established. Not surprising that people get confused, but an obvious way to achieve the technical needs of linking the WBC and GEA systems.

[#3]

I am having a very similar problem to the OP. My estimate is 47.7Mbps, but all I am getting is 24Mbps. I have had two engineers out and they tell me thats all my line can handle. I point out that the majority of the line is passing through numerous trees and branches, where it is pushed and pulled in all directions, and that this cant be helping things, but since the line passes all their tests on their JDSU, their hands are tied in that respect. Plusnet have been v.good, and have informed me that they have now escalated this back to Openreach. I await Openreach's latest response.

[#4]

Quote from: cwaite

How can plusnet claim that the Esitmate is Accurate to within +/- 1Mbit? When clearly as in my case its not Accurate to within +/- 1Mbit

I'd love to know that too;
From my member centre I have;
Estimated line speed:
55Mb (Accurate to within +/- 1Mbit) - Checked on 2013-01-10 20:26:01
Current line speed:
40 Mb
I really only get 35.  Not exactly the accurate +/- 1mbit 55mb it claims.  It even says last checked on the 10th, weeks after my install.  This needs fixing, especially when people (like me) use it in decisions on what to buy.

[#5]

Which product are you on Griff? And vital information needed is the full data in the BT speed tester diagnostic option results text boxes.
The 35Mbps on whatever speed test you are using is basically in line with being on a 40Mbps capped product. The stuff I've asked for from the BT speed test let's me reverse calculate to check your connection speed.

[#6]

During signup we give you an estimate and also say 'Download speed could vary between XXMb and XXMb.' What was the range you were given during signup and are you still within that range?

[#7]

Quote from: Oldjim

Quote from: shalom2010 Oldjim - may I refer you to http://www.plus.net/home-broadband/faqs/fibre-optic-broadband/ - Point 4 does not tie in at all with your commnet That is because it is wrong and Plusnet should have sorted it

Have we committed to sorting it Jim? If not then I'll happily get something raised to our content folk to see what they make of it. I'm not keen in us going into too much detail on that page though because, as we've seen historically with both 20CN and 21CN DSL services, DLM logic can change.

Quote from: cwaite

Anyway how can Plusnet legally state that their estimate is accurate to 1mb when clearly it's not in all cases.

It's an estimate. An estimate by nature isn't gospel. Having said that ...

Quote from: Estragon

Re the "accurate to within +/- 1Mbps", I agree that is silly and should be removed. I think it only came in recently, and someone tried to be too clever.  But the poster(s?) going on about advertising standards and legality I feel are a bit OTT. We just all need to point out that it shouldn't be there, and hope to get it removed.

The variance isn't a new thing and was originally put in place because the BT Wholesale line checker doesn't provide a speed range for FTTx products. It does for ADSL and we were trying to keep things consistent. I think BT Retail do the same so that's probably where the idea was born from. I agree that it should probably be changed. Should the range indication be increased or removed altogether though? I'm worried if it was removed that you'd still be left with a similar problem to that highlighted by this thread.

Quote from: Chris

During signup we give you an estimate and also say 'Download speed could vary between XXMb and XXMb.' What was the range you were given during signup and are you still within that range?

Based on what I've said above that's not strictly true

Quote from: ffox

Quote from: spraxyt For ADSL it is 10 days, for fibre 2 days  ....... one simple statement covers both ...and causes unnecessary delays before FTTC faults are rectified.

That shouldn't be the case. We can raise a fibre fault within the first ten days of service AFAIK.

Quote from: dai

I am having a very similar problem to the OP. My estimate is 47.7Mbps, but all I am getting is 24Mbps.

That's quite an extreme case. The estimate isn't always going to be accurate. One install I overlooked could only achieve a fraction of the estimate too. Turned out the line was aluminium rather than copper. They were lucky in that the other side of the street was fed copper from a telegraph pole and the engineer was able to steal a spare pair. Not everyone would be this lucky though. Not saying your line is aluminium of course, just highlighting one of the reasons why the estimate you receive may differ from the actual speed you're able to achieve.

[#8]

Hi All
From what I have been reading on the forums, in all fairness I can fully understand the above comments, however, the two issues of concern to me, are a) on several occasions PN staff have said wait for 10 days training period to end, then someone else at PN have realised that the profile has incorrectly been capped at 40, when it should be 80 (hence the low speed) & b) the number of people saying 'no shows' which I'm aware is out of control by PN but I'm sure a better system could be put in place.
I guess we don't live in a perfect world

[#9]

Quote from: Estragon

Which product are you on Griff? And vital information needed is the full data in the BT speed tester diagnostic option results text boxes....

I was on the 80/20 package with the extra bit added on.  I've now recently gone through a package change to switch to the unlimited package, as it was pointless me paying £26 for a capped service when an unlimited was a lower cost.

Quote from: Chris

During signup we give you an estimate and also say 'Download speed could vary between XXMb and XXMb.' What was the range you were given during signup and are you still within that range?

I don't recall seeing a message of "download speed could vary between x and x".  Even so, I (and I bet other users) would think an estimate would be maybe one to five mb difference from actual speed, not 15mb.

[#10]

Bob, as you have said in your last post The estimate isn't always going to be accurate. so how can you say during sign to FTTC up that the estimate is Accurate to within +/- 1Mbit this wording should be removed from future estimates.

[#11]

Quote from: Chris

During signup we give you an estimate and also say 'Download speed could vary between XXMb and XXMb.' What was the range you were given during signup and are you still within that range?

Chris I wasnt given an extact range during signup but I was told "40Mb (Accurate to within +/- 1Mbit) - Checked on 2012-12-19 11:48:53" so I assume the range from this statement is between 39mb and 41mb.

[#12]

Have just noticed today that my current line speed has fallen again from 37mb to 34mb according to the high speed broadband page in the member center!
Estimated line speed:40Mb (Accurate to within +/- 1Mbit) - Checked on 2012-12-19 11:48:53
Current line speed: 34 Mb
I am currently trying to raise a ticket through the broadband troubleshooter but get the message
Broadband Troubleshooter - Error

There's been a problem
Please try using the Broadband Troubleshooter again in a short while. If you continue to have problems please contact our Support Team for help.

[#13]

Hi there,
Sorry about that, though it seems it's worked since? I can see an engineer visit is booked for Saturday, hope that gets everything sorted out for you.

[#14]

The Engineer arrived this morning checked the line from the Pole outside to the green cabinet and said that he had noticed errors on the line, I checked my profile after he reconnected the line and the profile has dropped even further from 34mb to 28mb, when I told him this he checked the line again disconnected it and reconnected it but the profile is still 28mb he said they would monitor it for an hour then re-adjust the profile, well that was over 3 hours ago now and the engineer has not returned and the profile is still at 28mb. So now I am left with a connection 6mb slower than before the engineer came. And not sure if he thinks he has found out the cause of the errors on the line.
I have called PN who said that I would have to wait up to 72 hours for the profile to be adjusted. Is this correct or can the profile be manually adjusted?

When I signed up for plus.net in December I was told my esitmated speed would be 40mbs (accurate to +/- 40mb) on the day of connection (9th Jan 2013) my profile was 37mb, then 2 days later it dropped to 34mb now today (19 Jan 2013) my profile is 28mb, if this carries on soon I will be back to the speed of my ADSL broadband connection that I had previously from o2, am starting to wish I had just stayed with o2 on ADSL.

[#15]

http://www.dslchecker.bt.com/ says my line can handle 72.3Mb, I was also estimated this when I signed up.
Currently my max is 59Mb. When I called up there was a rude man who said that estimates are only estimates and that I should be happy as 59Mb is pretty fast.