8 Months on and My Fibre Profile is Still Dropping

[#1]

I joined Plusnet fibre January of this year as my Estimated Download Speed was 40 Mbps and my Estimated Upload Speed was 6.1 Mbps (Accurate to within +/- 1Mbit) when the broadband was fitted my actual download speed registered 36.1mbs which was fine then after a few days it steadily dropped and after a few BTOR visits they came to the conclusion that my line would support 28-30mbs (far from the Estimated 40mbs).
If your want the full picture on what happened back then you can see my postings from before
http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,110703.0.html
Anyway in the past few weeks I noticed a contractor doing some underground works in which they dug a trench from the side of the green BT Cabinet (cabinet 4) that I am connected to which runs to the entrance to the local school which is approximately 200m away, since they have filled in this trench I have noticed my profile has dropped from 28-30mbs to between 19.45-21.45mbs, I have also noticed that BT have lowered the estimate on my line from 41mbs to 22.1mbs, I have raised a ticket on this but plusnet have basically said the following:
"Following the investigation into your connection issues, our suppliers have now updated your lines estimated speeds.
When you sign up to take on fibre its clearly stated that your speeds are estimated. These estimates are based on post code, distance from exchange and expected rates in the area. Our suppliers will update these estimates when they investigate the line confirming the physical distance and quality so is a more truer estimate of speeds.
I understand this is not the answer you would like but it is the truth. We must honour our suppliers' estimates as we are only able to ensure that your line is capable of reaching your estimated speeds.
At the moment your estimated speeds are 22mb Down and 4.2mb Up. You are currently syncing at a rate of 22mb down and 5.6mb up, therefore your line is currently meeting and in part exceeding the estimated rate."
The above is just not acceptable I want at the very least an explanation to why my speed has suddenly dropped from 28-30mbs to around 20mbs overnight.
When I signed up for this fibre I was estimated a speed of 40mbs now I am getting half of what I was estimated, BT have suddenly without any explanation lowered again the speed of my line, how much slower will my fibre go before BT actually do something positive for me, a BT engineer said my line is approximately 650m long and according to the estimations my speed should be around 33.5mbs not 20mbs, its getting to the stage where its not really much faster than the ADSL connection I had with O2 Broadband.

[#2]

My speeds have also steadily dropped since I joined fibre last October. It's caused by cross talk, whereby more customers join fibre & cause the slow down. There's nothing that you can do about it.

[#3]

Quote from: cwaite

....our suppliers have now updated your lines estimated speeds. When you sign up to take on fibre its clearly stated that your speeds are estimated. These estimates are based on post code, distance from exchange and expected rates in the area. Our suppliers will update these estimates when they investigate the line confirming the physical distance and quality so is a more truer estimate of speeds.

From what I've seen, the updated 'estimate' is no such thing, it's based entirely on achieved sync rate.  BT (Wholesale/Openreach) already know line lengths quite accurately before they provide FTTC (at least on any line with ADSL) since the ADSL attenuation gives an indication of line length (OK there are exceptions on some lines) and they certainly know the line length to their cabinet!
Changing the 'estimate' after install to reflect actual line performance then saying 'you're meeting the revised estimate so everything is fine' is incredibly lame.

[#4]

Yeah it crazy that my line for the last 8 months has been plodding along quite happily at between 28-30mb and then for BT to suddenly say your line can only support 22.1mbs without explanation, is totally out of order! What if BT decide to lower the estimate again in the future?

[#5]

same thing happening to me estimate at install 55Mb and was that from Nov 2012 until April 2013 then slowly dropping and now at 48Mb, just checked BT line checker and my new revised speed is 36.9Mb so how can BT drop their estimated speed by nearly 20Mb in 8 months. The original estimate was achievable so why lower it by 33% or are BT using it as an opt-out when people start complaining regarding drops in connection speeds. 
So if I complain about a drop in speed they will now quote 36.9Mb as acceptable when 8 months ago it was 55Mb a cop-out by BT if ever there was one as their infrastructure can't cope with demand so revise the estimate speed in their favour and quote small print. I wonder if any other industry could get away with sort of retrospective sales technique.

[#6]

Further to my last posting to rub salt into my wounds I have found that my Neighbours that run off a 2nd pole in the small close that I live in have actually had an increase from 33mbs to 52.3mbs in their estimate speed on fibre, whilst I have suffered a decrease I am still trying to find out from BTOR via plus.net why this has happened, if anyone from PN can escalate this to get me some answers I would be most grateful.
There is obviously some kind of fault somewhere for my speed to drop so much in such a short space of time.  

[#7]

Quote from: cwaite

my Neighbours that run off a 2nd pole in the small close that I live in have actually had an increase from 33mbs to 52.3mbs in their estimate speed on fibre

This could sound like a silly question but does your neighbours line run back to the same cabinet as your line as some the houses in my street runs to a cabinet closer to my house than the cabinet my lines attached to. Seems silly but anything that's related to BT never makes sense goes back to the days of voice only services.

[#8]

If BT Wholesale are selling a service at an estimated speed the surely they are duty bound to keep as close as they can to those estimated speeds, they can't just go lowering peoples actual speeds by a significant amount then lower the estimate significantly. It has become apparent that BT Wholesale don't give a damn about the speed or service that the end user gets. I just wish there was another way I could get fibre to bypass BT Wholesale as in the 8 months I have had fibre they have done nothing but let me down time and time again.
@bjn
Luckily although your estimated speed has been lowered at least your actual speed is still pretty close to the original estimate of 55mbs, in my case something has gone wrong when they were working on the underground cabling and instead of investigating and fixing it they have copped out and just lowered the estimate.  

[#9]

 

This could sound like a silly question but does your neighbours line run back to the same cabinet as your line as some the houses in my street runs to a cabinet closer to my house than the cabinet my lines attached to. Seems silly but anything that's related to BT never makes sense goes back to the days of voice only services.

@bjn According to the BT Wholesale checker My neighbours run from the same cabinet as me (cabinet 4)

[#10]

@cwaite
You seem to be having a similar problem to me when work on cabinet takes place my connection speed drops. I've had 5 sessions of losing my internet connection in the last 8 months for between 1-5 days due to engineering work on cabinet. The latest was Monday evening this week and came back on this afternoon. Last time it was four days each time the speed drops by approx between 0.5 and 2Mb and never goes back up.
See  http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,117433.0.html ; for latest problem and Plusnet response.

[#11]

@cwaite looks like if we pass the fault back to BT an engineer visit will be requested, if you could let us know when you'd be available (weekdays between either 8am and 1pm or 1pm and 6pm) we'll get it booked in for you. Hopefully the engineer will be able to improve things for you.

[#12]

@Matt Taylor, I think this needs to be looked at from someone higher up than an engineer visit as all the engineer is going to fob me off with is that the line is operating within the revised estimates, I want to know why the estimate had been revised and even more important why along with the estimate being review why my actual speed has dropped 7 or 8mbs.
Also from experience earlier this year I made numerous appointments with you for a BTOR engineer to call and having taking a number of days off work they only actually showed up 50% of the time.

[#13]

Quote from: cwaite

as all the engineer is going to fob me off with is that the line is operating within the revised estimates, I want to know why the estimate had been revised and even more important why along with the estimate being review why my actual speed has dropped 7 or 8mbs.

I would be interested in a reply to the above, why revised estimates of approx 20mbs and my speed dropping 7mbs which are similar to cwaite experience?
I asked someone else who is a Plusnet Fibre unlimited user to check their estimate today via BT ADSL checker and they to have had their estimate speed reduced by about 20mbs begining to sound link a BT cop out as their network can't cope with increased demand.

[#14]

@bjn
Sounds like BTOR obviously don't want to actually find the root cause of your problem they would rather waste money and resources sending out and engineer every few months for you, and with all this waste there little wonder why they need to increase our line rental each year.
BT need a kick up the backside, I am hoping that soon the mobile providers will provide a reliable 5g service which will be usable in the home and give us a decent alternative to the age old copper wires that BT are refusing to replace.

[#15]

@ Bjn and cwaite I have just cheked mine I am stll on 49.7 meg the same that always have but never even got more than 30 meg had loads of engineers out and been fobbed off ie capped tried to do a uplift looks like got another vists coming lets see whats happens