IOL Access Denied for going over limit

kida

Rang tech support yesterday as I was getting a username/password invalid error when trying to connect.

I was then informed that I had gone over the download limit(just over 10GB) and was disconnected until the end of the month.

I was furious as I had checked with customer support prior to signing up and they said I would have to pay extra for going over but I wouldn't be disconnected. I was happy with this as I knew there would be months when I would need go over and was willing to pay for it.

yellum

Email: complaints@esat.com and give all this info. Nowhere in your contract does it talk about suspension of service right ?

kida

I have sent customer care a stinker. will foloow on to complaints.

The FAQs mention suspension for consistently above the limit.

My usage in 3 months is just over 24GB, 1 month under, 2nd slightly over,3rd 2 GB over - hardly consistent.

if you are consistently above this amount we reserve the right to suspend or permanently disconnect your account.

Iago

Seems a bit harsh alright, I wonder how they calculate this "consistent" overuse

the only possible explanation is that they calculate their limit on a daily basis and therefore if you are consistently over it every day for a month you will exceed their limit and be guilty of consistent overuse

as I said, very harsh if that's the case...

Sangre

There isnt a daily limit, it's done monthly, so that rules that out.

Krouc

Harsh alright. But this isnt shock from people like Esat. It will be very intresting to see how your situation turns out. imo this kind of complaint is going to become commonplace. Quality/availability of service before Spirit of Service.

k

Ancient1

Damn. I never thought they'd actually do it, you must be the first Kida...

kida

Spoke to a biddy in customer care and she couldn't actually show where it says this will happen.
She said its in the TOC.
I asked her to read it out and she couldn't. I have escelated it to a supervisor and sent an email to complaints.

In effect they are not following their own guidlines.

Ebonyks

I've been over their limit alot more than you and although having problems with logging in at the moment, have yet to be suspended.

:ninja: Also, this is off topic but, has anyone at all yet been charged for being over the limit?!? I'm begining to believe its only a myth, at least thats what i'm trying to convince myself :dunno:

Lex_Diamonds

Lol, theres a simple answer to all this. Well we all know what a shower of incompetants work the phones/accounts/etc in esat. Now several people have been having difficulty logging in, including myself. This problem hasn't been sorted out to my knowledge, so the person you were talking to literally pulled an excuse out of their arse. Its a problem they aren't aware of/cant solve so they'll feed you any old crap.

Thankfully I can log in after a few tries.

kida

I used to have log in problems - but usually got in after a few minutes.

but I had 2 people confirm the reason for me being locked out.

Ebonyks - are you over this month? I have a feeling this is a new introduction this month.

Ripwave

Originally posted by Ebonyks
:ninja: Also, this is off topic but, has anyone at all yet been charged for being over the limit?!? I'm begining to believe its only a myth, at least thats what i'm trying to convince myself :dunno:

What exactly do you think is a "myth"? It's not a myth that oreillycom "reserve the right" to charge you for going over, but in their case, they have alternative, higher price options that they can (and would prefer to) encourage you to "upgrade" to. They'd rather get a steady €90 or €180 a month from you (the VAT goes to the government), rather than €45 this month, and €170 next month, and €45 the month after.

UTV don't have the option of "upgrading" you, and IOL only have it in a limited number of phone exchanges (and even there, they're so incompetent, they probably wouldn't be able to switch you over).

So this is yet another situation where oreillycom set the restrictive ground rules that their competitors are forced to work under, while their own retail arm get to cherry-pick whatever suits them.

kida

Ripwave -

Thats funny - at least twice on the call I was told "you have the option to upgrade"

BKtje

upgrade to what? I wasnt under the impression IOL did anything apart from the basic service. Esat have their business connections but that needs special hardware and only in certain exchanges. Im curious what they teied to 'upgrade' you to.

kida

I presume it was the esat business package. I stopped her as soon as she started talking about it.

Ripwave

Originally posted by kida
Ripwave -

Thats funny - at least twice on the call I was told "you have the option to upgrade"

What telephone exchange are you on? The list of ESAT enabled exchanges is here.

uRbaN

When i signed up, I ws told it was absolutley no problem to go over the limit...you just pay the difference.
I dont think I was lied to, I like think the customer service representatives just arent properly trained or the training is not comprehensive enough.
There seems to be absolutley no communication between departments....its more like chinese whispers

kida

Lucan - and its not on - just proves they haven't a clue

Ebonyks

I'm not saying the charge is in any way fictitious, ofcourse they reserve the right (unfortunatey). But like many people have asked before me "Has anyone yet been charged?", or is it like a gallows above yer head (because the charge is pretty ridiculous as u well know).

Anyway...yep we're over this month again, although most can be pinned on the wee siblings :mad: Also i've been having problems with connecting before and after the limit was passed this month so.... but usually only takes up to 4 tries to get in on average.

OfflerCrocGod

Crap, Double Crap, Triple Crap just as I finally bothered myself to configure BT properly on the Downstairs computer so it can be left on all night to *do it's thang* this happens , I though nobody was ever hit by this that lots of ppl went over the limit and nothing ever happened - I'm still on and I'm well over the limit. The thing is I have a router that means I can be on for days on end without disconnecting.....so my present level 7.8Gb download and 2.5Gb upload is off by 4Gb at least and that's just downloads:(. Near the end of the month I may be able to get off with it but what if this is the new policy?. Has anyone else been hit by this?:(.

kida

I think once either upload or download is under 8GB you are ok. And it will only disable you when you disconnect and reconnect.

Ripwave

Originally posted by OfflerCrocGod
Crap, Double Crap, Triple Crap just as I finally bothered myself to configure BT properly on the Downstairs computer so it can be left on all night to *do it's thang* this happens , I though nobody was ever hit by this that lots of ppl went over the limit and nothing ever happened - I'm still on and I'm well over the limit. The thing is I have a router that means I can be on for days on end without disconnecting.....so my present level 7.8Gb download and 2.5Gb upload is off by 4Gb at least and that's just downloads:(. Near the end of the month I may be able to get off with it but what if this is the new policy?. Has anyone else been hit by this?:(.

Today is the 30th. How near to the end of the month were you planning to go?

oneweb

I had password problems the last few days, and I'm nowhere near the cap. Several attemps got me online ok. In fairness IOL shouldn't give out 'presumed' reasons for errors, but isn't it gas how many ppl jump and shout outrage etc etc...

kida

Ooneweb - it wasn't a presumption - 2 tech support people and 1 customer service person confirmed it. They at first thought it was a login error until they dug deeper.

I too had password problems this month but always got in after a few tries.

My issue with them is nowhere is it stated that the penatly for exceeding the limit is disconnection - they state you have to pay.

Ripwave

Originally posted by kida
Ooneweb - it wasn't a presumption - 2 tech support people and 1 customer service person confirmed it. They at first thought it was a login error until they dug deeper.

I too had password problems this month but always got in after a few tries.

My issue with them is nowhere is it stated that the penatly for exceeding the limit is disconnection - they state you have to pay.

The FAQ clearly states that "if you are consistently above this amount we reserve the right to suspend ... your account".

They don't have a copy of their T&C online (that I can find). Do you want to post the relevant sections here?

shinzon

Im sorry but tis a bit ridiculous crying over spilled milk now, there terms and conditions clearly state they reserve the right to disconnect you from the service for going over the limit

You must have gone way over the limit to warrant this action.

I keep saying in here but nobody listens you cant have your cake and then eat it, this day was coming and i could see it a mile off

Expect a change in there t and cs in the new year to reflect this policy

rather than reserve the right itll say we will disconnect you from the service or we will charge you for going over the limit

Theres nothing we can do to get you reconnected so take it on the chin and be more responsible for what you upload and download in the future

Shin

eth0_

Originally posted by shinzon
Im sorry but tis a bit ridiculous crying over spilled milk now, there terms and conditions clearly state they reserve the right to disconnect you from the service for going over the limit

You must have gone way over the limit to warrant this action.

Jesus Shinzon, try reading the guys post before you comment. His beef with IOL is that he asked them before signing up would he be charged for going over cap as there would be occasions when he would have to download more than usual. He was told, yes, you will be charged. No one told him he'd be disconnected. So really, he hasn't done anything wrong. He was fully prepared to pay Esat's huge per MB fee. So Esat are losing out here!

shinzon

Originally posted by eth0_
Jesus Shinzon, try reading the guys post before you comment. His beef with IOL is that he asked them before signing up would he be charged for going over cap as there would be occasions when he would have to download more than usual. He was told, yes, you will be charged. No one told him he'd be disconnected. So really, he hasn't done anything wrong. He was fully prepared to pay Esat's huge per MB fee. So Esat are losing out here!

and as we all know esats phone support is a1 in the knowledge department

sigh

shin

eth0_

Originally posted by shinzon
and as we all know esats phone support is a1 in the knowledge department

No, we don't 'all' know this. And he wouldn't have spoken to support, he would have spoken to sales as he was _signing up_.

When I ring a company and ask them something, I sort of take their answer at face value, I don't feel the need to ring back a few times and take a straw poll.

kida

Ripwave - I am hardly consistently over the limit. 24GB in 3 month(2 months under - 1 month over)

Shinzon - they reserve the right to disconnect or supsend you if are consistently over the limit - nowhere does it say that you will be disconnected ever time you go over.

eth0_ - You are right - I was willing to pay if i went over - it was important that I had guaranteed service - cost was not the deciding factor.

Ripwave

Originally posted by kida
Ripwave - I am hardly consistently over the limit. 24GB in 3 month(2 months under - 1 month over)

I'm not sure what you think the definition of consistent is - you said you've been over the limit for the last 2 months. That's consistent in my book.

shinzon

look at the end of the day, your cut off, theres nothing you or i or anyone here can do about it, take it up with esat.

and im sorry but if you believed a sales drone on the phone when she said what you said she said then you are the one thats at fault not her, you should have double checked triple checked and quadruple checked before you signed upto the service

Sales drones are there to sell you things, theyd say the sand was black and her granny was jennifer lopez if she thought she could talk you into signing up with them

her job was done when you signed up for the service, now youve been caught youve been cut off,

Im sorry i seem to be confrontattional on this, but i believe that a vast majority of people think that they can interpret the T and Cs whatever way they like, so it says "they reserve the right", ah sure theyll never actually do it so ill treat my capped product as a flat rate service, I see on boards time and time again that people say theyve never heard of anyone been charged for going over the cap

WAKE UP

Sooner or later those T and C's will be enforced as more and more people sign on and think they can use the service 24/7

In your case kida, you were misled by an expert esat drone, theres nothing you can do about that now, but perhaps the radsl product is not for you and you should switch to the ESAT business product instead if its available in your exchange


Shin

MickFarr

Kida, I live in Lucan and went with NTL, their download limit is 1GB a day or 30GB a month and also the download speed is 600kbs and it is the cheapest. Sometimes I'm over sometimes not but I never have connection problems !!:)

Did you check to see if you could get it in your area?

eth0_

Originally posted by shinzon

and im sorry but if you believed a sales drone on the phone when she said what you said she said then you are the one thats at fault not her, you should have double checked triple checked and quadruple checked before you signed upto the service

Oh my god, would you ever get a clue!! Who ever rings a company with a question, and then rings them back a few more times to see if the answer changes? No one! No one should have to do that, especially not this guy. He asked a company a simple question about the service, and was lied to. It's not his fault, it's esats. Proving this would be hard. You should always note down who you speak to in a company, but even if you have a name, the sales person in Esat could just deny they said it, and Esat can say 'well, you signed the contract, did you not read all the T&C's?'.

Why on earth are you taking Esat's side so much?

shinzon

No one! No one should have to do that

exactly no one should have to do that, but unfortunately thats not reality and ETHO if you think it is your deluded.

I at least triple check everything before i commit to something, especially where ESAT are concerned and i really dont give a damn if i annoy the hell out of companies when i do do it

Better to be safe than sorry.

And im not taking ESATs side on this, it was the guys own fault for not checking into this further rather than take the word of the first sales person he got onto.

Rushing into things is what leads to situations like kidas in the first place, if you dont have the proper information to hand then its your own fault nobody elses.


Shin

Ancient1

I at least triple check everything before i commit to something, especially where ESAT are concerned

Unfortunately i always feel compelled to do the same with Esat, nothing but bad experience with them.
Wish it wasnt this way, but it is - always have to write down the name of the agent, time, date, result of our conversation - coz whenever i dont i find them bullsh1tting me.

Woden

why can't they just charge him for the megabyte like has been mentioned before, they should just pop up something saying you have gone over your cap you will now be charged x cent per megabyte

bizmark

Bah never bleave esat their tech support/sales drones are idoits

Ethos is right though.....esat told him that it was ok to go over the limit as long as you pay per meg and never mentioned being cut off you should (more so if your new to esat) be able to take the sales staffs word as face value and not worry about checking 2 times 3 times or 4 times with esat

Its the Sales drones fault kida was cut off not his own he was only playing to the rules he was told about

But the lesson is! never EVER bleave a esat phone jockey its bad for your health and bank blance :rolleyes:

carbsy

Having just read the post in it's entirety.... you still feeling aggrieved shinzon by not being able to get any sort of broadband yourself? Or has your situation changed?

carb.

eth0_

Originally posted by carbsy
Having just read the post in it's entirety.... you still feeling aggrieved shinzon by not being able to get any sort of broadband yourself? Or has your situation changed?

carb.

:-D

shinzon

Please point out to me where in any of my posts above did i mention my broadband situation cause i cant see it

So lets recap for the millionth time shall we and for the lesser sighted I shall put it into point form to make it easier to understand

1) He got cut off for consistently going over his cap because he was under the illusion that everyone in esat tells the truth (sorry but thats plain gullible).


2) unless someone who reads this board comes forward and says that he works for ESAT then theres no use bitching about it on here cause there isnt a hell of a lot anyone can do

3) Reserve the right does not mean that they wont ever do it, it means they can exercise that right anytime they want which they did in this case.


Now thats my entire 4 posts on this subject put into point form, what any of this has got to do with my situation please tell me where or, you can read this post because its all there for everyone to read

God forbid anyone actually comes on here and tell it like it is

Shin

OfflerCrocGod

Well I'm back 2 whole days without Internet :mad:, on the dot of midnight my connection was restored ( Happy New Year :dunno: ), I was disconnected in the middle of a 2.5GB download of Tick stuff from BT - like that no warning it was on 7% and BAM, black light on the BT client, no connection anymore:(. Well I hit 11.5GB on the download side before I was knocked off I think my router saved me from being disconnected 3 days before on the Up side I hit 3.5Gb so it's one side hits 8Gb and you are OFF. What a cow:mad: .

mrblack

The sales lady misrepresented the T&C's to Offlercroc and he would be justified in voiding his BB contract with Esat (especially if he can prove the misrepresentation. ie does he have the name of the Saleswoman that gave him the incorrect infomation and the date) even tho he signed the BB contract which may have different T&C's because he was relying on the Misrepresentation before signing as an explanation of the T&C's.

If Offlercroc has NTL as an alternative like MickFarr and myself (or even the rat) then voiding his BB contracr would be a possible course of action for him.

Dont want to plug NTL but I find NTL BB great and haven't had any real probs with it at all and I have it since August. The Best BB in Ireland I think hands down!

daveyjoe

Originally posted by shinzon
Please point out to me where in any of my posts above did i mention my broadband situation cause i cant see it

So lets recap for the millionth time shall we and for the lesser sighted I shall put it into point form to make it easier to understand

1) He got cut off for consistently going over his cap because he was under the illusion that everyone in esat tells the truth (sorry but thats plain gullible).

2) unless someone who reads this board comes forward and says that he works for ESAT then theres no use bitching about it on here cause there isnt a hell of a lot anyone can do

3) Reserve the right does not mean that they wont ever do it, it means they can exercise that right anytime they want which they did in this case.


Now thats my entire 4 posts on this subject put into point form, what any of this has got to do with my situation please tell me where or, you can read this post because its all there for everyone to read

God forbid anyone actually comes on here and tell it like it is

Shin

1) What's gullible about it? He asked someone who was representing Esat at the time whether he would be cut off or not if he went over the limit, they said 'no'. He had no reason to disbelieve them.

2) I disagree, because a lot of Esat's customers visit this board, If they are getting close to going over the limit they might think twice now. I know if I was with IOL (which I'm not), This information would change my browsing habits.

3) Yeah okay that's fair enough, it still doesn't give esat the right to lie over the phone.

MrPinK

Originally posted by OfflerCrocGod
Well I hit 11.5GB on the download side before I was knocked off I think my router saved me from being disconnected 3 days before on the Up side I hit 3.5Gb so it's one side hits 8Gb and you are OFF. What a cow:mad: .

Would you rather have been charged 3c per meg for the 3500 megs you went over?!? I'd just count my blessings and stay under the cap in future.

OfflerCrocGod

Originally posted by MrPinK
Would you rather have been charged 3c per meg for the 3500 megs you went over?!? I'd just count my blessings and stay under the cap in future.

No - I'm pissed at the crap I'm being sold as BB, it's like getting cable TV and being told you can only watch it for 78 hours a month anything over that and you get disconnected :mad:. I would love to get NTL BB 30GB is closer to reality - it's the first of the month and my cap is already at 3GB after finishing getting the Tick and other South Park eps. In one day I have gone through nearly half my cap:mad:, thats plain crap. I am now going to afto be stuck browsing for the rest of the month and I wont be able to do anything else. When are we getting REAL BB in this country.

spongebob

Looks like you have been forgiven. (at least they only throttle back at the 'cap 'point.

M

OfflerCrocGod

Originally posted by Muck
Looks like you have been forgiven. (at least they only throttle back at the 'cap 'point.

I dont mind throttling I can live with that but outright disconnection is pure crap:mad:, it's a total loss of a service the entire family depends on!, what I'd prefer is this crappy cap to be gone totally but that will never happen.

kida

Heari s the reply I got from IOL Complaints.

The bit that makes no sense is
"
your allowance is calculated on a daily basis and consistant breaches will
involve disconnection.
"
This is is their interpretation of the FAQ. As far as I know there is no daily allowance- which is what this implies.



Dear XXXX
I am replying to your email with your query regarding our usage limits.

This is from http://www.iol.ie/broadband/bb_faq.htm :-

Is there going to be a data transfer limit?
From the 1st October you will be entitled to free transfer of up to 8
Gigabytes of data in any given month. This is double the allowance on the
eircom i-stream service.

If you go over this generous limit then we reserve the right to charge you
for any additional data (at 3cent inc VAT per MB)

This data allowance is calculated on a daily basis and if you are
consistently above this amount we reserve the right to suspend or
permanently disconnect your account.

As above and in your initial email according to our terms and conditions;
your allowance is calculated on a daily basis and consistant breaches will
involve disconnection.

Thank you for raising this query and your feedback is much appreciated. If
you may have any further queries with this information please do not
hesitate to contact our Customer Care team at 1800 923 222.

Regards
Complaints
Esat BT

Frank Grimes

Originally posted by MrPinK
Would you rather have been charged 3c per meg for the 3500 megs you went over?!? I'd just count my blessings and stay under the cap in future.

Also you can hardly feel sorry for him if that 3.5 gigs was from downloading South Park and Tick episodes from Bit Torrent.

kida

I have gotten the complaints department to say this in writing

"As per the previous mail the monthly limit is 8GB and over usage
will result in disconnection."

This clearly differs from their website.

"if you are consistently above this amount we reserve the right to suspend or permanently disconnect your account"

I think it is time for a complaint to advertising standards.