BT Claims - are they true ?

[#1]

Hi everybody, I received a t/p call from BT today attempting to poach me back to their company, although they were offering me a package at least £9.00 dearer than P/N. They were claiming that they could offer me faster broadband speeds, but I informed them that in the area I live, internet speed is really poor, (just checked my download speed = 301 kps, IP profile = 350kps and DSL connection rate = 568kps). They checked my line and stated that they could increase the speed to 3.5MB - over ten times faster than I'm getting at the moment. I questioned this, by asking why could they achieve a faster service than P/N seeing as P/N are a subsiduary of BT. The caller explained that only the line is rented out to other providers and I could be subject to noise, interference etc that could be causing the slow speed, but by going back to BT all would be well. I basically asked them to match P/N's monthly cost and I would consider changing - all I got was a ' thanks for your time - bye' !
Was it an attempt to 'con' me into going back to BT, or can my line really achieve the 'dizzy heights' that they claimed ?

[#2]

Typical sales pitch but you may have a problem with your line, Thats for PN to fix ( And they will ) If theres a fault.

[#3]

If you want an opinion from forum users on the likely capabilities of your line you could post your router stats, from this page if you are using the TG585 router supplied by Plusnet. You will need to login to the router with username admin and password CP... (the router serial number, all letters in capitals).

[#4]

I've recently moved to PN from Orange, after suffering low speed and patchy internet since May. My experience of PN so far is that they do take line faults seriously - I could never convince Orange that my poor speeds were due to line quality (they kept suggesting new splitters, routers,etc). I'm currently running at 4.4Mbps on PN (Orange was generally 3.5Mbps but nowhere near as steady, but had dropped to a 0.1-0.3 when I was forced to leave them)
Just make sure you've checked the obvious things at your end first, or you might incur call-out costs.
Adam

[#5]

Hi,
It's certainly possible that a line running at a low rate could support a faster speed. When I moved in to my flat and first plugged the router in I got about 1.5Mbps. After replacing the faceplate and getting an iPlate, removing the extension cable, getting rid of the phone and unplugging the Sky Box I'm now sync'd about 5Mbps.
Of course that's not going to be possible for everyone but there's no harm in trying and seeing if you can make a difference.
As spraxyt suggests, first thing is just post your line stats from the router and that can show if there's a decent possibility of more speed.
Also put your number in here:
http://www.dslchecker.bt.com/adsl/adslchecker.welcome
and see what speeds are estimated for your line. Also worth checking if you can get just ADSL or whether ADSL2+ and/or fibre are available in your area.
A lot of the slower speeds I've seen over the years are down to the internal wiring but it's usually easy to eliminate just by unplugging everything from the phone line and plugging the router direct in to the master socket and seeing if it syncs at a higher rate.

[#6]

Won't the BT checker just give you your current speed as the "estimate" when you've already got DSL? To get an actual estimate, you can use the postcode checker.
It used to tell me 256kbps or "you can't get broadband" when I had broadband but hadn't sorted things out, now it "estimates" 2.5Mbps which is the same as my IP profile.

[#7]

[#8]

Are you still on ADSL1 as a move to ADSL2+ would be needed for the higher speed
If you get 7600kbps on ADSL1 you will get a lot more on ADSL2

[#9]

Quote from: JamesM

My sister and her husband are with BT. They live about 20 yards away from me (further away from the exchange), are on the same exchange and my sister gets speeds of around 15Mbps download, I get around 7.6Mbps. I have been with Free-online since 1998 and can't be bothered changing providers but over the last few weeks I am considering going to BT. Either the BT home hub is better then my belkin N300, or Plusnet can't match the speed of BT.

I would take the advice of Dave's reply earlier. Putting your phone number in gives the best indication of speed you can now get - and if ADSL or ADSL2+ are possible and the difference that will make to you, and lastly if fibre is coming your way anytime soon. using your post code or address is not reliable. For me ADSL2+ will only give extra 0.5mbps, so obviously not worth it ( although my Belkin is an ADSL2+ Wireless G Router)

[#10]

Quote from: stefen

Hi everybody, I received a t/p call from BT today attempting to poach me back to their company, although they were offering me a package at least £9.00 dearer than P/N. They were claiming that they could offer me faster broadband speeds, but I informed them that in the area I live, internet speed is really poor, (just checked my download speed = 301 kps, IP profile = 350kps and DSL connection rate = 568kps). They checked my line and stated that they could increase the speed to 3.5MB - over ten times faster than I'm getting at the moment. I questioned this, by asking why could they achieve a faster service than P/N seeing as P/N are a subsiduary of BT. The caller explained that only the line is rented out to other providers and I could be subject to noise, interference etc that could be causing the slow speed, but by going back to BT all would be well. I basically asked them to match P/N's monthly cost and I would consider changing - all I got was a ' thanks for your time - bye' ! Was it an attempt to 'con' me into going back to BT, or can my line really achieve the 'dizzy heights' that they claimed ?

As the other post said, this is a sales pitch. You don't say how far from the exchange you are. I get about 3.3mbps, living about 1.5 miles from the exchange. I can only improve this (apart from moving!) by going fibre. This will happen in early September for me when the download speed is expected to be 31mbps - nearly 10 times greater. I could only get the max 40mbps by moving next to the exchange (or near enough). So you can see the difference as you start moving away from the exchange.
jim:green quote fixed mod:end

[#11]

BT are odd people. I was talking to someone who was putting in some lines at a new office and I mentioned about where I was moving to and he told me that he knew the area and >4Meg was perfectly possible. BUT PN (and the current residents) tell me that 2Meg is as fast as I'll get. So that implies that I could get more if I persuaded someone to replace all the cable.

[#12]

[#13]

I assume you have tried the test socket

[#14]

[#15]

In the test socket what are the router stats