New Fair Usage Policy Limits: Airtel Broadband has gone insane
June 14th, 2010 Leave a comment Visited 2673 times, 2 so far today
New Fair Usage Policy Limits: Airtel Broadband has gone insane
Airtel Broadband is one of the better internet service providers we had in India.
I have used HAD here because they used to be great. Not any longer.
The recent steps taken by the company to lower their costing have created such a mess that most Airtel customers are now looking for alternatives.
The biggest mess from the company has a very unfair name: Fair Usage Policy.
The mess started sometime last year and well it has magnified in the recent days.
The company announced earlier this year that they are going to double the speeds of all their customers who are on unlimited plans (speeds of up to 1mbps).
What they did not announce was that all of these new plans would feature a much worse fair usage policy.
I just checked out the latest broadband plans (for Delhi region). Here is what I get to see:
Browser 899 Plan
Speed: 512kbps unlimited
Fair Usage Policy: 512 kbps till 8 GB, 256 kbps beyond 8 GB
Swift 1099 Plan
Speed: 1mbps unlimited
Fair Usage Policy: 1 Mbps till 15 GB, 256 kbps beyond 15 GB
Impatience 1299 Plan
Speed: 2mbps unlimited
Fair Usage Policy: 2 Mbps till 20 GB, 256 kbps beyond 20 GB
Impatience 1399 Plan
Speed: 4mbps unlimited
Fair Usage Policy: 4 Mbps till 25 GB, 256 kbps beyond 25 GB
Impatience 1699 Plan
Speed: 2mbps unlimited
Fair Usage Policy: 2 Mbps till 40 GB, 256 kbps beyond 40 GB
Impatience 1799 Plan
Speed: 4mbps unlimited
Fair Usage Policy: 4 Mbps till 50 GB, 256 kbps beyond 50 GB
Browse 899-SL Plan
Speed: 512kbps unlimited
Fair Usage Policy: 512 kbps till 8 GB, 256 kbps beyond 8 GB
Swift 1099-SL Plan
Speed: 1mbps unlimited
Fair Usage Policy: 1 Mbps till 15 GB, 256 kbps beyond 15 GB
As you can see… All of these so called unlimited plans have pretty disgusting limits till which you would get the ‘labeled speeds.
Once you have crossed the limits, you would be switched to 256kbps which is the lowest speed that can be sold as broadband in India.
Airtel has taken some very creative steps to ensure that they would get to market these plans which looks to be priced very competitively. Few customers would research enough to realize that the promised high speeds are just a joke here.
I am not asking Airtel to provide unrealistic packages at unreasonable prices. But I do have a question for them… what are they trying to do? Take us back to the 1990s? We are in 2010 now. Broadband is supposed to get cheaper. Bandwidth is not getting any expensive. You have all the resources that you need to bring a broadband revolution in the country. Why mess everything up. Why kill all the goodwill your customers have created in the market today?
This is a major disappointment. I wish Hayai Broadband gets their things in order and launch their services in at least the metro cities this year. I would be the first customer to switch to them.
Checkout: Airtel Broadband Forum for latest customer experiences
Airtel, Airtel Broadband, Airtel Fair Usage policy, Broadband, India, Internet
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what about 749 plan?? it used to have all the specs of 899 plan 2 weeks ago (512kbps speed)
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LikeI want to quit airtel is there any unlimited plan-1Mbps available in other broadband services??
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LikeMTNL and Reliance have true 1mbps plans. Other ISPs should have them as well.
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Likeu better look at TRAI format and then say about Airtel. There is nothing about Airtel in these plans.
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LikeI used pay 650 for 256 Kbps Unlimited until last month and was thinking of switching over to Airtel, that is until my ISP decied to double up my speed for FREE! Now I think that I made the right decision by not calling Airtel.
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Likewhat isp you have right now? :)
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Liketruely said mate.
I think the objective of the company is now just to make money by fooling their customers.
They say the plans are unlimited,then why the hell are they putting FUP of 20 gb in their recent plans(which was earlier 100gb for unlimited plans).....i am using airtel for past 8 years and never had such kind of issue with hem......i m now thinking to switch to MTNL as they provide 1 mbps for just 999rs
And also airtel is not having any plan with 100 gb FUP and 1 mbps speed.
Moreover According to the Airtel Press Release of march the speed of the customers will get doubled at no extra cost (http://www.airtel.in/wps/wcm/connect/About%20Bharti%20Airtel/bharti+airtel/media+centre/bharti+airtel+news/telemedia/pg-airtel-breaks-the-speed-barrier),but again instead of changing the speed they have launched new plans.
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Likewell you do have the option of going for MTNL. for folks outside delhi-mumbai, bsnl is not doing much.
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