Broadband Speed Halved Since Contract Expiry and Renewal - normal?

[TheDoc74]

Hi folks,

Alluded to this issue in another thread about not receiving any End of Contract Notification for broadband, but wanted to ask in this forum as it's quite a specific issue.

Signed up for Superfast 2 in late 2019, and I have to say the service was fantastic - I had a constant sync speed of 74Mbps throughout the entire contract as per the (then-extant) Minimum Speed Guarantee, and a rock-solid connection.. However, it seems that my contract lapsed in May 2021 (I had assumed it was a 2-year contract, but apparently not) and since then the speed has dropped to a constant 42Mbps (although I was still being charged for Superfast 2 on a rolling basis).

I phoned Vodafone a few days to renew the contract, was told by the sales agent that I needed a new router with a new contract and that would speed things up. Signed up again, I'm aware of the 10 day DLM period etc but the speed is still at 42Mbps. Another agent has since told me I don't need a new router as my 2019 model is the most up-to-date.

I suppose I'm curious about why the speed dropped once my contract ended, and although I've been emailed with a guarantee of 73Mpps, I'm not sure why the 10-day calibration period is needed since I've been a customer for over 18 months? The speed remains at 42Mbps. Will this genuinely speed up to the minimum guaranteed 73-odd Mbps (bear in mind, the line is clearly capable of this as I had it for 18 months until contract expiry). I'm finding it difficult to understand why my speed was reduced when out of contract, and am wondering if the sales agent was being misleading when she said a new router would fix the issue. I contacted support to see when the new router would be delivered and was told I wouldn't be getting one.

I just want my old, fast service back! Has anyone else suffered from significant speed capping once a contract has lapsed (which, again, it wouldn't have done had I been notified!)

[Jayach]

It's unlikely the speed dropped because you were out of contract. The latest router is the THG3000, if you joined in 2019 you may have the HHG2500. In my opinion the newer router is better, but they should give the same sync speed.

If you could post your connection stats it may shed some light. On the THG3000 they look like this:

Line Quality

  Downstream Upstream

Current Rate	78725 kbps	20000 kbps
Maximum Rate	80591 kbps	30559 kbps
Signal-to-Noise Ratio	6.3 dB	12.7 dB
Attenuation	DS1 9.2 dB, DS2 22.6 dB, DS3 35.2 dB	US0 2.0 dB, US1 15.6 dB, US2 25.2 dB
Power	12.8 dBm	4.9 dBm
CRC Errors in last 22616 minute(s)	27	4898
K (number of bytes in DMT frame)	0	0
R (number of bytes in RS code word)	10	0
S (RS code word size in DMT frame)	0.0987	0.3819
D (interleaver depth)	8	1
Delay	0 ms	0 ms

Also what does the BT checker give for your line?

BT Broadband (btwholesale.com)

[TheDoc74]

Hey Jayach,

Thanks for the reply. My router is the THG3000, so seems like it is the most up-to-date one. My connection stats are as follows:

Line Quality

  Downstream Upstream

Current Rate	42177 kbps	12131 kbps
Maximum Rate	45312 kbps	11774 kbps
Signal-to-Noise Ratio	3.9 dB	14.2 dB
Attenuation	DS1 29.0 dB, DS2 24.7 dB, DS3 24.6 dB	US0 45.7 dB, US1 21.9 dB, US2 22.5 dB
Power	13.2 dBm	5.9 dBm
CRC Errors in last 116 minute(s)	0	1
K (number of bytes in DMT frame)	0	0
R (number of bytes in RS code word)	14	16
S (RS code word size in DMT frame)	0.1719	0.6239
D (interleaver depth)	4	1
Delay	0 ms	0 ms

And here's what the broadband checker has to say:

It's all a bit baffling, really. As I've said, service was flawless until a couple of days ago I noticed the low sync speed on the app. It was only by clicking on it that I learned I was out of contract. I don't know whether it's too early to badger Customer Service, as they'll probably just cite the 10 day thing, but I don't quite grasp why that (re)calibration is necessary since I'm a long-term customer.

[TheDoc74]

I did reply to this, and included an image which was flagged for moderating (just a screenshot of the BT Broadband checker) and now the post seems to have disappeared completely. Gah. Will try again.

[Jayach]

If it included personal details such as the telephone number they will remove it.

[TheDoc74]

It definitely didn't. I've just noticed that my OTHER reply (minus photo) also seems to have been removed - this is infuriating. When I post the table from the connection stats, it warns me about HTML issues and gives me the option to remove them. I do this, and post. The post was DEFINITELY there five minutes ago, but it's gone now. This is driving me nuts.

[Jayach]

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@TheDoc74 wrote:

When I post the table from the connection stats, it warns me about HTML issues and gives me the option to remove them. I do this, and post. 

---

Yes, that always happens to me too.

Try adding the picture as an attachment instead of in-line. They don't seem to moderate those.

[TheDoc74]

I've tried copying and pasting the Connection stats as plain text, and posting again. But I suspect it's disappeared again.

[TheDoc74]

Here goes.... both files should be attached. Router is the THG3000.

[Jayach]

Well there is definitely something very wrong there.

The BT checker say you should be getting close to 80Mbs, but you are only syncing at 40ish but with low SNR which says there is no room for more speed.

The upload is also low, but with a high SNR so should have synced higher.

I think you need to speak to Vodafone and say your stats are bad, hopefully they will run some checks and see a problem.

Unfortunately nobody there will understand if you try to explain it to them, but basically it need passing to Openreach. Possibly all it needs is a DLM reset, but that has to be done by Openreach.

From the BT checker it looks like you have the options of FTTC, Vfast and FTTP - Lucky you.

Now you have to deal with Vodafone support - Unlucky you.