Off Peak Plans/Restructure

[David R]

I havent fallen into the trap of exceeding 100 gbytes in Off Peak time yet; still, for a hypothetical scenario where I did make that effort I'd like to think my regular/60 gb subscription would (possibly) save my bacon.

It wouldn't bother me in the slightest (my view having thought about this for a while ) if for a change in structure Exetel actually decided to make Off Peak bonus values to match with Peak data allowances. Too conventional for Exetel? Sure. Still, worse ideas seem possible.

Let's keep this in mind: the scarcer a resource(/data), the more valuable it seems.

So. What if a '30GB subscriber' were extended a 30GB/"soft"Uncharged Off Peak for bonus*?
*The default setting (desirably) is "shaped account" and, assuming the client wished to exploit Exetel: s/he would collect 30GB + 'theoretically' a ~40GB@512Kbps'shaped' for a total downloads of 70GB bonus. [ 100GB ] from a 30GB monthly starting point, not a bad value if responsibly made available through shaping.

Extrapolate the example to a '80GB subscriber'/an "ultra heavy" downloader and similarly s/he might achieve a 80-20 combo for a 100GB downloads of 'uncharged/bonus' time; total 180GB including Peak time. If, further, you were to include the <50%/shaping 'buffer' for Peak which of course is a "strict limit before being booted", this would bring to the maximum the physically permissible amount possible to ~220GB/mo - noting a good portion of it under 512Kbps control.

So you see ForumADmin/Clover, 80->200GB-plus and you've achieved a big win for keen broadband users in a clever and transparent manner. Perhaps more important, you'll have not overtly screamed the word "Unlimited" to those (inevitable) people who never will be pleased with your buying power.

• 512Kbps, I'll wager, will strike just the right balance in that 90% of people won't bother to download the net but rather choose to keep their good speeds available (keeping within their headline allowances) up to the end of any month.
• By employing 'symmetrical allowances' (linked to subscriber spend) we could probably aim for 8 hours of uncharged+shaped speed without throwing away as many customers to Optus Cable / TPG.
• I'd suggest 1:00am-9:00am a great timezone for traffic.
• 0.0004/8Gbps*3600s=0.18GBph =< 43GB per month (maxed), based on "8hour" shaping Off Peaks
• With Optus/Dodo/AAPT & iPrimus/ iiNet & aaNet/ supporting 12, 8 or 9 hours; Exetel's uncounted' could use a polish.

[CoreyPlover]

The concept of "symmetric allowances" has appeal on a number of levels, not least of which is alignment of benefits with revenue.

I think there is, however, a fundamental flaw in all of your analysis and suggestion: you haven't asked the question of why Exetel would wish to make their products more attractive to heavy downloaders.

You say that Exetel are "throwing away customers" to Optus cable and TPG. I would counter this by saying that "giving these customers away" to other ISPs is a good thing as it frees up bandwidth, increases Exetel's profit and places downward pressure on prices. This is a much more tangible benefit than trying to compete for the heavy downloader market.

TPG recently purchased Pipe, meaning they will be able to undercut any ISP in terms of price per GB download quota. Why would Exetel want to compete with that?

[gong_guy]

TPG recently purchased Pipe, meaning they will be able to undercut any ISP in terms of price per GB download quota. Why would Exetel want to compete with that?

No it not about competing with TPG. Isn't it about adding value to their products?

Exetel have decided to offer an off peak uncharged period, it would be great I believe if that was better defined. You only have to read Whirlpool to see the constant questions on how much is acceptable? No-one knows now.

Even saying a flat 20Gb would be a great improvement.

[ForumAdmin]

I'm not sure how to overcome the apparent misunderstanding of how any ISP provides services as each one is different.

Exetel provides services at the lowest possible costs to its customers and attempts to make every attempt to provide as much as possible for as little as possible.

If you look at the MRTG reports that are made available to every Exetel customer it's obvious that there is spare capacity on the majority of links in the network between 2.30 am and 7.30 am and Exetel encourages customers to schedule downloads in that time to both give themselves a benefit from a resource that would otherwise be wasted.

Fair enough?

What Exetel doesn't want are customers who take every millionth of a second of that time to download as much as can possibly be done in that period - we can't afford to provide a service to such customers. Contractually we will provide services to such customers for as long as the contract requires.After the contract expires we will advice such customers that they should find another provider who will better be able to meet their huge download 'needs'....TPG comes to mind or AAPT but undoubtedly there are others.

There are, currently, less than 500 Exetel customers who fall in to that category. The other 99.5% or so customers download when they need/want to in the off peak period (using the wasted resource to provide themselves with a sensible benefit as was intended) and don't max out their connection for the allotted 6 hours every day of every week.

Exetel simply isn't the right ISP for people who do that. There are other ISPs that will suit them much better than Exetel currently or ever can.

Those now 500 customers cost Exetel ten times+ what the other 99.5% of our customers cost us and we don't believe we should lose huge amounts of money providing services to them.

That's it - 99.5% customers benefit from 0.5% of uncontracted customers moving to another provider of their choice.

[CoreyPlover]

Isn't it about adding value to their products?

Yep. And sure, I think that making the off-peak as transparent as possible is a good suggestion. But continuing to increaseoff-peak is not the only way to add value. In fact, it is probably the most risky way to "add value" in light of the current ISP environment. I think Exetel would be better placed continually trying to maintain low prices, or giving back benefits that do not encourage or entice heavy downloaders. For instance, increased "loyalty" or "longevity" rewards, retrospective discounts for "good" users (i.e. those that act in Exetel's best interest and restrict or schedule downloads, etc), dollar for dollar matched donations (which I suspect they are already achieving with their own donations).

[Col]

Yep. And sure, I think that making the off-peak as transparent as possible is a good suggestion.

I wonder what the current 3x average number is. I would rather Exetel go back to that system - if not a publicly stated hard limit on the plan pages once again. The ambiguity surrounding the offpeak limit slightly damages Exetel's image imo.

[ForumAdmin]

Yep. And sure, I think that making the off-peak as transparent as possible is a good suggestion.

I wonder what the current 3x average number is. I would rather Exetel go back to that system - if not a publicly stated hard limit on the plan pages once again. The ambiguity surrounding the offpeak limit slightly damages Exetel's image imo.

What would be the point? The number of people 'affected' (500) know very well what they are downloading and how they are downloading and providing a limit would not change their usage - unless we wanted to charge for excess which we have been moving away from.

We lose no customers we want to keep and as those huge down loaders move to other ISPs who are happy to provide services to them the 99.5% customers who aren't affected benefit - everyone wins - unless I am not looking at it in the right way?

[Klaas]

The ambiguity surrounding the offpeak limit slightly damages Exetel's image imo.

In my opinion, the only people who would find the lack of a defined limit to be a problem, would be those who want to leave the internet tap running all the time. As ForumAdmin has stated earlier in this thread, Exetel prefers that these type of users move to other providers.

For my usage, having a window where I can, if necessary, download large files without penalty to my quota is a comfortable fallback, should my downloading start to get close to the quota on my plan. In the meantime, I manage my downloads to be well within my quota (although I may be atypical in my usage - web/email, downloading the inevitable software updates, and downloading movies and TV shows from iTunes - I don't run any torrent software).

[Col]

What would be the point? The number of people 'affected' (500) know very well what they are downloading and how they are downloading and providing a limit would not change their usage - unless we wanted to charge for excess which we have been moving away from.

We lose no customers we want to keep and as those huge down loaders move to other ISPs who are happy to provide services to them the 99.5% customers who aren't affected benefit - everyone wins - unless I am not looking at it in the right way?

Mightn't they change their usage if there is a limit? Just as people shift their downloads between peak and offpeak mightn't they also postpone some unimportant/schedule-able downloads for the following month? If they are able to see goalposts then I bet some of those 500 customers would change their usage accordingly, and some of them will just cause a fit and leave... which is okay because you are wanting to make them go to another ISP anyway. It's the concept of giving those people a chance to stay, and being more friendly to your customers. There have been several people on Whingepool saying that they wish they had received a warning or something that their usage was too high. If you bring back the 3x average limit then you can still tell them to leave like you are doing now, and as you were doing before when the 3x average limit was around - it's just giving customers a warning.

The ambiguity of the limit would be worrying more people than the 500 people already over the limit. There would be another small percentage of users with the thought of being kicked at the back of their minds who perhaps are nowhere near where Exetel deems someone a big downloader, yet they are worried anyway.

The current situation just reminds me too much of viewtopic.php?f=288&t=34308 - but atleast then you gave us the 3x average limit with a "no less than 60GB" nod to appease some.

[Ravenous]

Removed See viewtopic.php?f=24&t=36532&p=278743#p278743

[Col]

In my opinion, the only people who would find the lack of a defined limit to be a problem, would be those who want to leave the internet tap running all the time. As ForumAdmin has stated earlier in this thread, Exetel prefers that these type of users move to other providers.

For my usage, having a window where I can, if necessary, download large files without penalty to my quota is a comfortable fallback, should my downloading start to get close to the quota on my plan. In the meantime, I manage my downloads to be well within my quota (although I may be atypical in my usage - web/email, downloading the inevitable software updates, and downloading movies and TV shows from iTunes - I don't run any torrent software).

Well I'm not really speaking on behalf of myself. I just often find myself becoming the devil's advocate as it were, and often see and understand both sides of an argument. I fully support Exetel getting rid of big downloaders, I just wish they did it more transparently. I manage my downloads to fit within my quota too and personally have no fear that I'll be asked to leave.

It is difficult to word this, apologies if it is in anyway inflammatory.

An individual can probably be labelled as either having the 'wrong type' of plan or as a 'wrong type' of customer if there is a need to actively pursue a defined off-peak limit in order to 'squeeze' the maximum usage from the service without consequence.

That's a very valid perspective. It however didn't stop the thread I linked to in my above post from going on for 17 pages before it was eventually locked. Now I don't wish to have that label applied to me (I respect the offpeak period and my usage over the past 12 months has been pretty stable - I don't set out to download all I can) so you stating that is actually a pretty good intimidation tactic to get people like me to zip their lips, or rather stop typing. I however still stand by what I have said. It's not about squeezing every last drop for me, it's just about transparency towards customers and potential customers.

In my view having no limit hurts a small group of customers, whereas having a limit hurts no customers.

[David R]

• 0.0004/8Gbps*3600s=0.18GBph =< 43GB per month (maxed), based on "8hour" shaping Off Peaks.

• 512Kbps, I'll wager, will strike just the right balance in that 90% of people won't bother to download the net but rather choose to keep their good speeds available (keeping within their headline allowances) up to the end of any month.

[Ravenous]

a pretty good intimidation tactic

I am merely presenting my own feeble opinion. I regret that it appears negatively. Strike out "can probably" and replace with "may possibly".

[ForumAdmin]

a pretty good intimidation tactic

I am merely presenting my own feeble opinion. I regret that it appears negatively. Strike out "can probably" and replace with "may possibly".

The ONLY customers who have been asked to find a more suitable provider who will better meet their needs are customers who have down loaded excessively - the largest was 1.2 terabytes in the off peak period in one month down to in excess of 200 mbytes in the 6 hour off peak period.

Some of those customers were on a $30.00 per month plan and only used the off peak period with negligible use of the other 18 hours a day.

That has always been the case and asking such customers to move to an ISP better able to meet their needs is best for them, best for other Exetel customers and best for Exetel.

The number affected so far has been less than 200 customers over the past three months and the number that will eventually be affected is less than 700 in total.....much less than 1% of total customers.....close to 0.5%.

Looking at the MRTG reports I would think that if you used the 2.30 to 7.30 am period for downloads you could down load up to 140 gbytes of data in 'off peak' each month without affecting any other customer's usage. By doing that you get what you need and do it using a resource that is currently being wasted - win/win for every customer and Exetel.

A customer who "needs" to download more than that in the six hour off peak period would be much better off with another ISP.

[cdonges]

Looking at the MRTG reports I would think that if you used the 2.30 to 7.30 am period for downloads you could down load up to 140 gbytes of data in 'off peak' each month without affecting any other customer's usage.

That's cool that 140GB is considered reasonable. In the last 3 months I have been 120GB, 100GB and 90GB off peak on a 60GB peak plan. Looks like I am a reasonable customer.