Hi,
I am a BT Business customer with FTTP 900Mbps+/110Mbps.
When the service initially went live around a year ago it was rock solid and all speed tests were showing 900Mbps+ down (pretty much everywhere I test it).... this was great and I was raving on about how good it was.
Recently I noticed some buffering when streaming some very high quality video content which should never happen on the current package so I started to investigate.
What I noticed was the speeds were showing around 330Mbps-600Mbps (sometimes a little more but depended on the time and server I was testing against). This was considerably slower than I've seen before. I must also point out that this is not WiFi, I take this out of the equation and only use my gaming spec laptop.
I decided to call BT who said they couldn't really test anything because I'm using my own equipment and not theirs. My router is pfSense on a Dell R210 II with 8GB RAM. It is more than able to manage high-speed circuits and nothing has changed since the initial install in regards to any of the hardware on the network so my tests should be the same as when it was installed.
BT did their initial tests and said no fault was found on the line and asked if I can plug in the original equipment which I did. This removed all my other network from the equation and only my laptop was plugged into the BT router. The speeds were showed anything from 300Mbps to 650Mbps depending on the server used. The agent also did their own test which said it was falling below the minimum guarantee from their end so agreed to send an engineer.
A few days later an engineer turned up and did his own tests with his own equipment plugged directly into the ONT and could see the same results I was getting, basically nothing top end and randing from slow to intermediate speed depending on the server used. He agreed there wasn't something quite right, however he couldn't do anything because he was an engineer from "Cube" and not an Openreach engineer. I was pretty annoyed at this point because it's supposed to be a next business day fix and sending someone who couldn't do anything but verify the issue was pointless.
So I got back on the phone to complain and booked a proper engineer for the next day. When he came he saw me testing with my own equipment (everything else on the network shut down), and with just the BT router and my laptop plugged in and speeds ranging from 220Mbps to 500Mbps depending on the location of the speed test server. He tested the light on the fibre which was very good he said and so he went off to pick up a better ONT which has only just recently been released and designed for higher speed circuits. Once installed it didn't seem to make any difference so I asked him to entertain changing the point my connection was plugged into in the street. As soon as he did that I saw my speeds increase a bit. I was now getting around 700Mbps (ish). This still wasn't where it was when I got it installed originally but we both agreed it's a strange issue and said we would leave it to see if it would improve over the next few days. I said I would report back to the person who was dealing with my complaint.
Over the next few days I did more than extensive testing which included (but not limited to):
Playing with MTU and MSS settings
Playing with other TCP settings
Changing the network card and type used for the connection and vLANs
Changing various settings on the switches
Upgrading their firmware
Resetting and re-configuring the switches
Upgrading cables to shielded ones
and much more...
Even though I knew I shouldn't have to do this because BTs own equipment wasn't giving me the speeds I was used to I was just trying to get what I can out of the line and ensure everything was optimal.
When the agent called me back on the Monday I explained all the tests I'd done and up until 8 hours prior the best I could get out of it was around 750Mbps which was better but still not where I'd like it to be. However when she called it had gone up another 100Mbps or so and I was getting in the region of 850Mbps whilst others were using the connections as well. I was happy even though it was a tad slower than when originally installed but not by much.... so a little compensation was added to the account and case closed.
Now moving to the present time just a few days later my speeds are back to very slow (compared to what I should be getting) and very high what I should be getting. My recent tests as of this morning show speeds ranging from 156Mbps to 890Mbps depending on the time and location of the server.
The connection just seems to be all over the place and not-consistant with any speeds. It's 100% not my end as I can monitor thoughput with my router (pfSense) and see nothing else is using the connection when I'm testing, I also shut down all WiFi APs and ports on all switches.
The most logical reason behind it to me suggests congestion in the area (but BT deny this could ever be a problem with fibre and I totally disagree) or some kind of routing issue. Maybe congestion with a peering partner or problem with a router/hop down the line. I don't know but nothing says to me it's my end with all the tests I've done and using BTs equipment with nothing else plugged in. Even engineers using their own equipment agreed something isn't right.
Right now I'm not sure where to turn, I just feel I'm paying for something I'm not getting which is frustrating.
Can anyone offer any advice?
Thanks.
Kind Regards
Jacob
