Posts by Sparkacus

Capgemini scores £150m contract to help Student Loan Company overcome its IT problems 5 years after £50m superfail

Itemise

I can’t wrap my head around these type of figures. I don’t suppose someone with insider knowledge could break this down?

I would never have guessed the SLC being such a complex beast. I can only assume that hiring a group of well paid developers, devops etc is too difficult…..

Virgin Media to hike broadband prices by nearly 7 per cent

Fair use policy

I'm actually cancelling my Virgin Media package this week funnily enough. I've been a customer with VM for longer than I can remember, always taking the top package, as high internet speed is something I enjoy.

My monthly bill is in the region of £110 (Increasing on a regular basis now). I chose the top package as I wanted the fastest consistent internet speed a home ISP could provide. The package is wonderful, all dandy.....but if you decide to use that package to it's fullest extent, Virgin media have a wonderful fair use policy that basically cut your internet speed in half or more, that's right, pay for the top package and use it, they'll halve it for you.

The final nail in the coffin was when I wanted more than 4Mb upload (5Mb is what your suppose to get... lame). After calling a call centre in India I believe, I stated that I wanted at least 10Mb/s upload, I'm on the top package, happy etc, but I require faster upload. Long story short the answer was a resounding ...NO.

I rarely go above the fair use policy, but I have been traffic managed a few times, mainly because of my large backup files that i upload to Dropbox etc, but my upload speed is often reduced by 60%+, and I've given up. The few times that I actually need to use the full power of my connection and I get a smack in the teeth when doing so. I'm then told to basically 'upload out-of-policy-hours'.......PARDEN, screw you, I pay for the top package and if I dam well want to use it, I will.

So good bye VM, never going back to you, Ta dah and hello Infinity 2. May not be the fastest package, but at least I gonna get what I pay for and an upload rate close to 13Mb/s (The rate my neighbours get). Really VM, 5Mb/s upload on a 100Mb/s download package, you clowns. I have a house in the country in Eastern Europe that gets it's internet connection from a tower 1 KM away and my upload speed is over 8Mb/s.