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Poor Synchronisation of Plusnet and BT I/P Profiles

ejs
Aspiring Hero
Posts: 5,442
Thanks: 631
Fixes: 25
Registered: ‎10-06-2010

Re: Poor Synchronisation of Plusnet and BT I/P Profiles

Quote from: jack21
Update: My own P/N profile still hasn't auto-updated after 8 days since the BT profile rose, covering tue, wed, thu, fri, sat, sun, mon, tue  nights, so surely that must give plenty of evidence.....or is it the case that if the profile isn't updated within 24 hours, then it is never going to be auto-updated?

In my experience, once it has missed its chance to change, then it will remain stuck. But a future ADSL resync and subsequent profile update may or may not work automatically.
orbrey
Plusnet Alumni (retired)
Plusnet Alumni (retired)
Posts: 10,540
Registered: ‎18-07-2007

Re: Poor Synchronisation of Plusnet and BT I/P Profiles

Hi Jack21,
Bear in mind we've already fixed (from what we can see) everything possible from our side, as Chris has posted elsewhere in a number of cases we go to download the update file for a user and it's not actually there. We are talking to our suppliers and are pushing as hard as we can but it's certainly not going to happen instantly. We are of course still checking for other issues on our side as well.
Quote from: jack21
And has your team considered my various suggestions about what to do about it whilst also engaged in finding/fixing the problem for the whole Plusnet community ? ie....
  1. For an affected user, be able to 'fix' the P/N profile at a mutually-acceptable value.....unaffected by the equalisation process.

This depends on us being able to set the profile on demand on our suppliers' side and also requires the user to understand profiles and set one that will actually work for their line. The former isn't possible and the latter.... let's just say the users in these forums are far more interested in how their service works than our average customer is.
Quote from: jack21
  2. Have a PN Control Panel option to 'Resync Profiles'

If the system was working correctly there'd be no need for this as the profile would update on our side as soon as it was updated on our suppliers'. In the mean time it's a lot of work for something that wouldn't actually fix the main problem we're seeing at the moment - i.e. we go to download an update file and it isn't there.
Quote from: jack21
  3. In the process logic: if no delta file found, set P/N profile to that band-matching the current sync rate; you really should have some alternative to cover situations where no delta file is found.

On the one hand this is a good idea, but the trouble is it goes against the reason we have profiles on our side - if we don't have a profile set the traffic management system is essentially pointless as packets are dropped at the exchange rather than sent there at a rate that ensures they all get through as prioritised by our equipment. If we were to base the profile on our side on the sync rate it would almost always be above the supplier profile on the line leading to the problem I mention above.
Quote from: jack21
  4. If this is widespread, turn it off altogether until a foolproof process can be devised.

As per previous answer, this would make our traffic management platform ineffective unfortunately.
Quote from: jack21
  5. Make it easier to phone/ticket/Forum Support and get a 'nudge' without over-complications.

There was a thread that we were checking regularly for profile updates, failing that I guess you could PM one of us but I'm not sure how much easier we could make it? If it does get any worse then I'll see what we can do about resource but at the moment it doesn't seem that things are out of control.
I'm sorry if that seems overly negative, thanks very much for thinking about it and coming up with the ideas. I assure you we're not letting this drop.
jack21
Grafter
Posts: 189
Registered: ‎25-02-2009

Re: Poor Synchronisation of Plusnet and BT I/P Profiles

Thanks for your detailed reply, Matt, much appreciated. Could anyone imagine getting such an appropriate, detailed response from any other ISP, because I can't!!
One point re item 3 of my suggestions: you say that your delivering a faster service than the BT profile permits would cause problems....but that is exactly the case when the Plusnet profile fails to drop whenever the BT profile drops - I see that happening too, as well as the Plusnet profile failing to follow the BT profile upwards. And yet I see no ill-consequence of the Plusnet profile being higher than the BT profile. Very oddly, the Plusnet profile DOES eventually fall to match the BT one - 3 days is the longest I've seen it remain higher, so you must have a fallback process to cope with that.
I recall that when I joined Plusnet from BT way back in 2008, this profile sillyness was present then; it must be a very obscure issue indeed to track down and correct  if it is still defeating the Plusnet and BT experts.
Plusnet profile mismatching is probably quite widespread, but I'm prepared to be contradicted - I have no definitive overall evidence other that the numbers of profile-nudge compaints and request I see in the Forum. But after all, who is likely to notice a profile mismatch? If your normal sync rate is above maybe 3Mbps then unless you performed speedchecks, or curiously went looking at your profiles, would you even notice a difference of one 0.5Mbps profile band? On the other hand, if your normal sync rate is 1Mbps then you would notice if the Plusnet profile got stuck at say 0.5Mbps. Out of my 200 or so 'clients', I estimate that only 1 would go looking for profile mismatches, even tho most are like me, in a very low syn rate area (3Mbps at one end of the village, 1Mbps at the other - long village, poor and variable quality wiring and attenuation). Many of such 'clients' affected by a profile mismatch would just tell me that their computer has slowed down.
Don't let me over-cook this tho; Plusnet services are still among the best in the business as far as I'm concerned, and apart from this issue, I have nowt to complain about. I will continue to recommend Plusnet to my long-line clients where appropriate, tho I still find PostOffice phone+line+broadband to be more appropriate to some others. The reason that Plusnet doesn't see significant numbers of referals from me is that I refrain from asking for mentions from my clients in order to avoid any thoughts of my having any self-interest motive for recommending Plusnet.....a few have given my name without saying so though (that's OK by me).
I simply wish/hope/trust that Plusnet will stop 'living with' this problem, as it  (probably incorrectly) appears to me after 4 years of experiencing it , and take determined and positive steps to fix it properly for all their customers. And to publicise the progress!
Regards,
Jack
jack21
Grafter
Posts: 189
Registered: ‎25-02-2009

Re: Poor Synchronisation of Plusnet and BT I/P Profiles

Matt,
Could you give me an idea of how widespread this profile problem currently is, by telling me the approx number of delta-file-not-found reports you typically get per day?
Thanks,
Jack