Eircom wont oversell me their broadband

Same with me eircom point blank refuse to let me even TRIAL a higher speed, bloody irritating

pssst! Eircom have never charged or cut anyone off for going over the limit so all their packages are in essense already unlimited. :pac:

If your line can take more than they're currently providing don't do anything. I had 18 months of hell with BT and UTV because they didn't follow this line. Connection cycled to connect every 90 seconds. Eventually went to UPC and now have 30mbps unlimited when my eircom line can still only deliver 3mbps.

I don't get this, why would eircom not essentially use a similar system use as is used in the UK by BT to provide the highest stable speed possible on the line? Or even their more crude but basically effective system which they use for 7.6 mbps products?? If the line's not good enough, offer 4, 5, 6, or 7 mbps max on the line. They really should let the customer know if this happens as opposed to saying nothing until the customer has to check the line stats.


Anyway, there should be no reason why eircom will sell the up to 7.6 mbps product to the large majority of lines and not sell the 8 mbps product to anyone except those lines estimated to handle it. Constant disconnects wouldn't happen if they even used their existing system, never mind the more thorough approach taken by BT in the UK...

I'm not sure where you got the product info for BT broadband, as their website is markedly different. They offer all customers a speed of up to 20 mbps per second when you order now. See http://www.productsandservices.bt.com/consumerProducts/displayCategory.do?categoryId=CON-TOTAL-BB-R1

The FAQs also imply that nearly every half-decent exchange has ADSL2+ rolled out to it by now.

The issue of dissatisfied customers is easily addressed by not advertising the product or offering it to anyone who has an inferior line, but should anyone come to eircom explicitly looking for the product that they are told they will receive less than the stated speed. They are quite good at selling "up to" 7.6 mbps to a wide variety of customers already, so I don't think realistic speeds of 4 or 5 mbps would really deter them in this case either.

Cabaal wrote: »

I'm referring to BT Wholesale products which the vast majority of ISP's in the UK incl BT Retail re-sell.



Upto 20MB is not available on every exchange...infact it still pretty much in a minority outside of the bigger citys and towns this is very common knowledge for anyone dealing with ADSL in the UK.

The BT Retail website will still allow you to order an 20MB package even if your line can only support say 1.5MB

Small print is fun
"




Yeah its nice to imply, but doesn't always make it the case



Yet thats what they do in the UK and it often leads to complaints

This is why ISP's in the UK just offer upto 8MB, 15MB or 20MB etc yet line speeds can be as low as 512K on a 20MB package.



I get where your coming from, however its not worth Eircom's time or money changing its ordering system just because a handful of users actually understand their line quality....most users don't understand such technical limitations

I'm not sure why you're addressing every part of my post out of context, my substansive point is small and straightforward. If customers are not offered it full stop unless they insist on it, then they would walk into signing up to it with eyes open. I'm not asking for the business product to be offered to the general market, I'm simply making the point that customers who are fully informed of the risks should be able to spend their money on a DSL product, limitations and all.

I believe it's wrong to say that what happens in the UK is the same as what I proposed. They are clearly offering an "up to" service to all customers, while I'm saying that it should only be given to customers who explicitly ask for it after being told that the speed element of it will be sub-par. Eircom's systems already tell the call operators what the expected speed is based on attenuation readings, so it would be clear to anyone that there is a likelihood of it not working at full speed from the very outset.

There's no real change to eircom's ordering systems if they simply provide it on the same basis as the home 7.6 mbps service, except that they do not offer it to consumers who won't get full speeds without an explicit request over the phone. Like what happens for customers who explicitly request for a change in their line's interleaving. I've never heard of anyone complaining from such a request in the past, the users generally know what they're getting into when they go looking for something specific like that.

Besides, I really didn't mind about just how widespread BT's ADSL2+ is. You claimed BT's max wholesale product was 8 mbps, which is not the case from what I sourced to. I can only assume that if BT retail offer that, Ofcom would ensure that wholesalers have access to the same speeds and availability? Even if not all wholesalers were to provide up to 20 mbps, the point is that BT wholesale themselves do provide it?

Cabaal wrote: »

BT Wholesale's ADSL Max and ADSL2+ products are separate wholesale products, ADSL Max is only upto 8MB.

BT Wholesale provide both; however ADSL2+ is not yet on every exchange where as ADSL Max is.

I see in your earlier reply that you did highlight an ADSL2+ product, that's fair enough. So you didn't say that they only provided ADSL1:)

The public availability of the fixed products do seem to be fairly limited, BT retail don't seem too bothered to provide them either. In fact, I could only come across one example of a fixed 1 mbit product being offered on various websites. My "study" was pretty inconclusive though!