Unknown restriction on connection - Help

[#1]

All, I need some help please.

I have a 40mb unlimited fibre contract. Been having some challenges with speed of line. Contacted Plusnet support several times, resulting in, Openreach coming to visit. Openreach spent 2 hours fixing and optimising the line, very thorough. The guy did a DLM reset before he left, but it kept reconnecting at exactly 35mb.

He said the line is now very good, capable of 43.7mb, so should easily achieve 40mb. He says because it’s reconnecting at exactly 35mb, he suspects a limit is applied by Plusnet.

Plusnet did another DLM reset to unband the line and they said it had a profile which was removed..it reconnects at 40mb for a few days, then after a few days of stability, it reconnects at a lower rate, which is now exactly 33.5mb

Been through a few cycles with support but it’s so frustrating. The line is capable of 40mb and I’m convinced is being throttled back for some reason. The connection speeds are too exact.

How do I get someone who really understands this to help me achieve what line is capable of?

Please help.

[#2]

I have the exact same problem and have been trying to get it fixed since October last year. I have been with plusnet for nearly 7 years and always had a download speed at around 59meg until last year when it started dropping the speed down to around 45meg then sometimes around 33meg. Every time I get through to the technical support they say they need to send out an openreach engineer, so they come out fiddle with god knows what and the speed is back up to around the 59meg as normal. within 2 weeks it has dropped back down again and they insist that another openreach engineer has to come back out and yet again the same thing happens, I'm still no further forward to it being fixed and plusnet think it is acceptable to make me have to constantly stay in waiting for engineers to visit. I have the exact same thoughts as you and think that it is someone changing the settings and causing the speed to be throttled. I have now stopped dealing with plusnet to fix the problem and have been in contact with the ombudsman for help. Good luck with trying to get the problem fixed as I think you will need it.

[#3]

Also I have just done a quick test at https://speedtest.btwholesale.com/ and apparently im only on a 50mbps profile which confirms that settings are being changed. I'm obviously not going to receive my 59mbps that I have had for years if they only have me set to a 50mbps profile!

[#4]

They confirmed in the past a profile was applied but they have now removed, but it seems some other profile has been re-applied.

[#5]

Yeah they say its an automated thing and it happens when it detects problems on your line, things like your router restarting itself is picked up as being unstable and dropping your speed profile down to make it stable. They need to stop all this automated [-Censored-] and if us customers detect any problems then we can contact them, probably save them a lot time dealing with customers with the problem.

[#6]

Good morning @JTT74

Thanks a lot for getting in touch, I can see that one of my colleagues has raised a new DLM reset on the line, this should complete by early next week.  

[#7]

Thanks Adam, looks like the DLM reset happened last night in the early hours , but alas the same 35mb profile has been applied…!

It’s connected again at exactly 35mb, same as when Openreach engineer was here.

I wish someone could actually just remove all limits and profiles, it’s so frustrating..

[#8]

Thanks for getting back to me, so when I ran the KBD and RRT this morning, the profile was still banded at 30Mbps. A new DLM reset was raised by our faults team which should complete next week.  

[#9]

Thanks Adam, how do we stop these profiles getting re-applied afterwards. It’s always good for a few days and then some profile gets applied?

Thx again

[#10]

The profiles get applied because the DLM detects issues which the user might not notice.

@adam945 what do the VR plots look like?

If this is a Plusnet Hub One (BTHH5a) running router stats might illuminate the cause of the issue.

[#11]

Thanks a lot for getting back to us @JTT74. In answer to your question, it can vary to be honest. Banding can sometimes be applied incorrectly, in which case we'd raise a DLM reset, though in other cases, it's applied to priorities stability, by slowing the line down. 

In other words, is a symptom of disconnection on a line over time. Looking at your stats actually, it appears that the latter might be an explanation here. 

@Townman, the VR below does show some disconnections, but I wouldn't say it's anything major, however saying that, we find that an RRT is more accurate in detecting drops on an FTTC line, so I've popped that below too. The bars reflect the number of disconnections on a particular day. 

@JTT74 have you done any form of troubleshooting to reduce the number of disconnections you're having? 

[#12]

Hi Adam, thanks for following up.

There have been so many DLM resets and requests for me to reboot the router from Plusnet, I imagine this is it. The line is completely stable otherwise.

It’s still connected at a restricted 35Mb today, no disconnects since last forced restart (at request of plusnet).

Can we do a full reset and I’ll not touch the router and see how stable it is?

Thanks,m

[#13]

@adam945 

Thank you for the most useful comparison and explanation.

I guess that we need to recognise that the VR plot shows a loss of PPP session, whilst the BTw report shows a loss of sync.  The fact that the VR plot appears to show one PPP session down, but the BTw report indicates 5 events, one needs to conclude that the following are possible...

• There were multiple losses of sync at the time xDSL was dropped and PPP was lost
• That PPP sessions can be maintained over a loss of the xDSL session - something which seems illogical but has been postulated previously
• The VR plot does not record all establishments and loss of PPP

If this is a Hub One, I would strongly recommend running the version of routerstats tailored for the BTHH5a - see the link below.

[#14]

Uh, oh! This is catching, no? 🙂

https://community.plus.net/t5/Fibre-Broadband/Connection-to-Service-Becoming-Slower-and-Throttling/m...

My 'theory': https://community.plus.net/t5/ADSL-Broadband/Line-Banding/m-p/1867446#M346537

[#15]

Below was the latest ticket raised. Closed today saying resolved but it’s still at 35mb, so nothing has changed…the DLM profile is still there.

[CSA Removed] - CSC Analyst
9:54am, Thursday 14 Apr 2022
Dear Mr Reynolds,

[internal]
Continuation of ticket 223346799. The customer contacted and informed that the fault is still persists.

Raised FTTC DLM reset request

Circuit reference - BBEU37709618

Workplace product -Unlimited Fibre

Current sync rate – 33.5Mb

DLM profile - Latest Downstream: 0.128M-35M with Retransmission (High)Latest Upstream: 0.128M-10M with no error protection

Expected profile - 38Mbps to 40Mbps

Is provision correct? - yes

Has the Service View test passed? - yes

Open fault reference - 5-885268739713

Kind regards,

[CSA Removed]

Moderator's note by Dick (Strat): CSA name(s) removed (to an area staff can see) as per Forum rules.