I think my speed has been capped.

[#1]

Hi 
my connection is to the first socket with no other connections

a couple of months back I swapped from John Lewis to plus net. Whilst with John L my line speed was pretty stable at 68m down load. Up at 18m it had always been like this trouble free for well over a year. 

I changed to Plusnet ultra and for some time the speeds were same as John L and above. I received an email from plusnet to say my speeds are working ok at 61+. Then a month ago I noticed big drops, when measured my up was sometimes below the 10m This was also with the faceplate removed and using the filter with a wired connection.

Three weeks ago I placed call and engineer arrived. After running tests he found no fault.

I am continuing to run without faceplate and no speed drops, except now the speed seems to be pegged at 49.7 when I run the tests. It never changes no matter how many tests I run.

could the engineer with his box of tricks wound it back?

[#2]

I can sympathise.

My speed problems have been 'investigated' 5 times now with the same result.

The engineer resets back to 33Mbs (which is probably the best I can get), it stays at that for a week, then starts sliding down every few days 2 or 3Mbs until it reaches 23Mbs or just above the MGS. On average it drops out once a day mostly in the early hours of the morning.

I'm expecting yet another engineer's visit next week. Supposedly of a higher competency through plusnet escalating the fault.

It goes without saying that my expectations of him resolving the fault are not high.

Ian

[#3]

Thanks for getting in touch @Shadrack I'm sorry to see you're experiencing speed problems. I've tested your line and I can see your router is getting a line speed of 57.4mbps with no artificial restrictions showing on your line.

If you're interested, here's a copy of our testing:

GEA Test Detail
Circuit ID	NA	Service ID	[redacted]

Test Outcome	Pass
Test Outcome Code	GTC_FTTC_SERVICE_0000
Description	GEA service test completed and no fault found .
Main Fault Location	OK
Sync Status	In Sync
Downstream Speed	57.4 Mbps
Upstream Speed	20.0 Mbps
Appointment Required	N
Fault Report Advised	N
NTE Power Status	PowerOn
Voice Line Test Result	Pass
Bridge Tap	Not Detected
Radio Frequency Ingress	Not Detected
Repetitive Electrical Impulse Noise	Not Detected
Cross Talk	Not Detected
Estimated Line Length In Metres	592.2
Upstream Rate Assessment	Very Good
Downstream Rate Assessment	Good
Home Wiring Problem	Not Detected
Downstream Policing Discard Rate	0.0
Customer Traffic Level	Upstream and Downstream Traffic Detected
Technology	VDSL
Current 15Min Bin Retrains	0
Last 15Min Bin Retrains	0
DP Type	External
Profile Name	0.128M-80M Downstream, Retransmission Low - 0.128M-20M Upstream, Error Protection Off
Time Stamp	2019-11-19T15:45:00

Parameters	MIN	MAX	AVG
Down Stream Line Rate	17.7 Mbps	69.3 Mbps	60.2 Mbps
Up Stream Line Rate	17.1 Mbps	20.0 Mbps	19.8 Mbps
Up Time	0.0 Sec	900.0 Sec	896.7 Sec
Retrains	0.0	10.0	0.0

Current and Last 15 Minute Bin Performance
Parameters	Last Traffic Count(Upto 15 mins)	Current Traffic Count(Upto 15 mins)
Start Time Stamp	2019-12-01T16:57:54Z	2019-12-01T17:12:54Z
Ingress Code Violation	1	0
Egress Code Violation	0	0
Errored Seconds	0	0
Severely Errored Seconds	0	0
Unavailable Seconds	0	0

The download speed you're getting of 49.7mbps seems to be about right for your current line speed although it might be a tad on the slow side. Did you run the test with no other devices connected into the router wired and wireless, and no open applications in the background on the computer you were using?

With regards to your line speeds dropping from 68mbps, looking at the 'downstream line rate' on our testing above, this is showing that in the past 14 days your line speeds have varied between 17.7mbps and 69.3mbps, which would be as a result of the intermittent drops you've had over the past 30 days at least. 

Unfortunately as there's no artificial restrictions on your line and it seems that your connection has settled down at a speed within our suppliers current expectations of your line at between 51.9mbps and 73.3mbps as shown Here I'm afraid there'd be little we can do to investigate further. With some stability I'd hope that your speeds go back up by themselves.

If your connection continues to drop out, I'd recommend reporting a fault to us at http://faults.plus.net so we can arrange another engineer to investigate this further as there'd clearly be an underlying problem somewhere.

Let us know if there's anything further you'd need help with or advice on.

[edit]

Hi @chroma2000 I'm sorry to see the continuing problems you're experiencing with your broadband service. I can see we've raised an escalation with our suppliers before the engineer next week.

Can you let us know how it goes on the day?

[#4]

Hi Gandalf,

Thank you for the tests and time spent.

No, there were no other devices or apps using the connection whilst I ran the speed tests directly from the first socket.

I don’t fully understand the figures and findings. All I can go on is the history also including that of previous providers under the same test conditions.

My tests were done with ookla before using the bt test.

My first provider was bt and speeds were always reliably 66m+ 

Then with John Lewis Similar, often topping 70m+

I joined Plusnet in September and speeds were lower but solidly 60-61m for two months. Then unfortunately a few weeks back I had to book a fault as speed suddenly dropping to around 10-20m.

Since engineer left after a ‘no fault found’. My speeds now never go above 51m with ookla, using the bt test no matter how many tests I run the fastest speed is always the same within a byte, every test exactly  the same. 49.7

Just reading the above it points to something having changed drastically when the engineer was here.

whether something has been changed in my router, I don’t know, but you can see where I am coming from looking at the pattern from above, the speed went when the engineer went.

After seeing what is possible, I am disappointed with the loss of 30% of my speed. Hopefully someone can come up with a solution as to why this has happened.

Thank you again for your work and time investigating.

[#5]

Why does my reply to Gandalf with further information keep being removed?

Moderator's note by Mike (Mav): Several duplicate posts released from Spam Filter and subsequently removed.

[#6]

Thanks for getting back to us @Shadrack

Our tests are showing the speeds have been higher in the past but are lower now

We can look at sending another engineer out but as the speeds are now showing as within the estimates there may not be much more we can do.

If you want to go down this route raise a fault here so we can look into that for you

[#7]

Hi Mathew Wheeler,

Thank you for looking the issue. I understand what you are saying and do appreciate your teams efforts up to now. The original reason for engineers visit has fixed the stupidly low erratic speeds. Although the engineer advised me he could not find a fault, it certainly has not returned. This I suspect is maybe something to do with the face plate. The engineer ran his tests with it removed and I am now running via a filter and no face plate.

But at this visit is when my prior solid speed went from 60-70mbps to exactly 49.7mbps.

Thanks for the link to the engineering people. I have gone down this route and relayed the above info to the line techies.
I do find this, not only disappointing but also frustrating as I know history tells me what my bt line is capable of.

I sit and wait now that I have done the preliminary tests and see what the outcome from the line technicians is to be.

i will update you with the outcome.

Kind regards and thanks again to all,

[#8]

The excellent engineer did extensive testing and has concluded that the error level is now as low as can be expected and that further improvement in reliability can only be achieved by replacing the ageing aluminium cable that goes back to the street cabinet with new copper cable.
Unfortunately Openreach will not want to do this unless it is cost effective, or more customers in our road also raise complaints about their poor speeds.

[#9]

Thanks for getting back to us @Shadrack 

I've added a reply to the fault ticket you've raised Here

If you can post back once you've responded we'll be happy to pick it back up as soon as we can.

Thanks for getting back to us @chroma2000 

I'm sorry to see the engineer was unable to improve your speeds due to the length of the aluminium cabling. Hopefully this is replaced in the non too distant future although it's something we'd have no influence over.

Let us know if there's anything further you'd need help with. Apologies for the inconvenience.

[#10]

Unfortunately I don't see Openreach replacing it voluntarily unless a) they decide that resetting my line every month is too costly or b) the other residents in my road begin to notice how poor their speeds are and actually complain.

[#11]

@chroma2000 Disappointing but it doesn’t sound like there’s much anyone can do without upgrading the infrastructure in the area. 

[#12]

Hi Gandalf, Mathew.

Thanks up to now, I did raise a ticket for an engineer as you suggested. There has been a lot of too and frowning on the ticket and even one engineers visit. but not a lot positive movement forward as I see from my end.

Another engineer was promised for yesterday but for some reason did not show. Not even a phone call. I was not too pleased as you could well imagine after having rearrange a few things.

now to make matters worse my slow speed is even slower. I tested the speed through the early hours of this morning (2,3 &4am). The bt tests were carried out with the face plate removed and a wired connect to my laptop.

from the 65-70mbps just a month or so ago, now right down to a now 30-35mbps. This morning back up to 46-48mbps.

now that was even below the guaranteed 38.5mbps. (I did take pics of the displayed results)

i thought this low level guarantee was in place to protect the supplier at times of high usage. Not the early hours of the morning. At this time I would have expected the 61+mbps that I signed up to and the historical steady 60+Mbps over the past several years

something has seriously gone wrong in many area’s.

i do hope someone is there to help and sort this out.

kind regards

[#13]

Hi @Shadrack,

Thanks for coming back to us.

I appreciate the frustration of the missed engineer appointment and apologise for any ongoing inconvenience.

I've consulted our suppliers Openreach and they have provided an update here.

Please can you let me know (here or via the ticket) how you wish to proceed.

Thanks - LF

[#14]

Hi & Thank you LordFoul.

I have posted some suitable times for an appointment on the ticket.

Hopefully and Fingers crossed they can soon find what has caused this degradation in the overall speed.

Kind Regards  

[#15]

Hi again LordFoul, Mathew, Gandalf,

I thought Plusnet are currently dealing with my speed fault, yet I have just received the following via email,

Your speed fault

Hello Xxxxxx, 7 days ago we asked you to complete some actions as part of the investigation into your speed fault. We've not heard back from you, and need to let you know that if we don't hear from you by 7 days we'll assume that this is no longer an issue and will automatically close your fault. Don't forget that you can run a speed test at http://www.speedtest.btwholesale.com/ (more info) and we have some advice on the things which can affect broadband speeds on our help pages. If you've contacted us today about your fault then please disregard this email.     Kind regards, Plusnet Customer Support www.plus.net