ISP promises totally unlimited broadband guaranteed
Tuesday 24 July 2007 15:38:54 by John Hunt
ISPreview reports that All Fast Access (www.allfastaccess.com) has started advertising an almost unbelievable offer. They claim to offer 'totally unlimited broadband, guaranteed'. Their Platinum Extreme package offers a standard up to 8Mbps ADSL speed with 'true unlimited usage' and no fair use policy. The service comes with a guarantee protecting users against restrictions due to heavy usage within the first 3 months:
"If we have to restrict your broadband activity, by either slowing down your speed, charging additional fees, closing your account or any other nasty way to get you to use less bandwidth we will offer you a complete refund of your first 3 months fee plus your £1 migration fee."
All Fast Access Guarantee
The monthly fee is £26.99 with migration from another ISP costing only £1. Sound too good to be true? There are a couple of restrictions that we can see. Firstly, the guarantee only applies to a decrease in speed within the first 3 months of service caused by usage restrictions. Secondly, all Platinum Extreme users are placed onto the same Central pipe, so once this is full, contention may occur there. Whether this could be deemed as a method of limiting or restricting users speeds is left open to interpretation, but All Fast Access could levy this as a "customer satisfaction" issue rather than an imposed restriction, thus not being covered by the guarantee.
We recommend our visitors to be generally wary of offers that sound too good to be true and to pay close attention to the terms & conditions to ensure you understand under what circumstances you can leave the service or get a refund. That said, the demand for 'unlimited' broadband is sure to draw more customers to such deals.
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In the unlikely event you wish to cancel your broadband contract with us you will be required to pay £60 or continue until your contact has been completed.
Be Warned !!!
"All Fast Access will only pay out refunds if they contact customers regarding the following (A) discontinue a service due to over usage (B) Charge customers additional fees due to over usage (C) Restrict any services, includes but not limited to speed restrictions, time restrictions or P2P restrictions (D) Close your account or ask you to leave due to heavy usage"
Remember this is advertised as UNLIMITED - yeah right!
The Terms and Conditions aren't even in correct English.
For example
"Customers agree to pay £1 migration fee and is subject to 3 month contract. Customers may choose to pay £15 at any time is discontinue with their service during their 3 month contract"
"..is subject to.." sounds like chav/street speak to me
seems likely it will be a bad boy pipe type service with contention doing the throttling for them.
I wonder how long before the forums are full of complaints about this company now thinkbroadband have gave them some free advertising.
so the big question is, who can you trust to give you an unlimited service and for it to be at least 8mbps without being tied in to a bundle offer or the like? I am about to switch from orange but everywhere i look there are pro's and con's. any ideas? (i know that i can't do much worse but i want the best)
hey halesquad - why dont you try zen - not according to industy service awards - they are the best service going. you are only gonna get 8 meg if you go to a tier 1 isp on llu - with orange (wanadoo) you have already tried that) - and they will still cap/throttle you down, and send your calls to india. at least with zen you get an honest service up to 8 meg, with office services unlimited. their pro service at 34.99 for 50gig seems pretty fair, I mean who needs more than 50g ??? 1 mth contract too. i'm with them and they are totally fab
quote "There are a couple of restrictions that we can see. Firstly, the guarantee only applies to a decrease in speed within the first 3 months of service caused by usage restrictions. Secondly, all Platinum Extreme users are placed onto the same Central pipe"
And there people is the catch, after 3 months when everyone has joined thats when they will introduce throttles or just let the central slow to a crawl. Sounds like a big con to me personally, although its clever marketting speak ultimately its gonna be a con.