Is this Illegal?

Forums › New Zealand Broadband › Is this Illegal?

Jord

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#33280 5-May-2009 22:30

I recently changed broadband from a longtime customer of ihug(Vodafone) to Slingshot after ihug changed our email address on us from Username@adsl.ihug.co.nz to Username@ihug.co.nz, and wouldn't have a word of it. Slingshot was reccomended to me for their great data.

Since I changed to Slingshot I have been somehow using a lot more data than usual (Instead of like 10GB, Probably hitting about 20). I initially installed Monitors/Meters to check out if there was any truth to the statistics Slingshot were telling us. It wasn't, so I phoned them (one thing decent about Slingshot is your not on hold for 2hours, thankgod) and 2 different people both told me that they thought our data from 5am-7am was being counted. Those who are not familiar with Slingshot - they advertise/offer 1am-7am offpeak free.

After an investigation into this I was told this is not the case, and they have no idea why this was going on and couldn't give me any info other than the times/dates data was being used. After about 30minutes of discussion:

He told me the free offpeak is actually counted 12.45am-6.45am, not the 1am-7am advertised but thinks this should have hardly any difference. Firstly this is besides the point, it is false advertising, and 15minutes of torrenting is what i work out to be about 150MB or so of torrenting. Doing that everyday, adds up to about 5GB - a decent chunk. I have now just resorted to making torrents 1am-6am (seeing torrents schedulers work like normal people, to the hour) which cuts out an hour of what I should really be getting.

What should I be doing about this?

CYaBro

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#212710 5-May-2009 22:49

THe first email address you listed was your login for your router not your email address!
The second one you have listed is your actual email address and would have always been this.

Opinions are my own and not the views of my employer.

Ragnor

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#212711 5-May-2009 22:50

Dodgy old Slingshot! Put in a complaint about false advertising?

If you really wanted too you could probably go to the disputes tribunal but for the $ involved for 5GB per month it would be a waste of your and their time.

Also I recommend never rely on ISP email addresses, registering a domain is cheap and easy (under $35 per year). Then get some cheap hosting ($5 per month) or even using google apps for domains standard (which is free, 25gb space per account) for your mail services. You then have total control over your own email addresses, anything@yourdomain.co.nz etc.

Jord

4 posts

Wannabe Geek

#212712 5-May-2009 22:51

CYaBro: THe first email address you listed was your login for your router not your email address!

The second one you have listed is your actual email address and would have always been this.

Firstly, this was not the main question, but thanks for the response. Actually we were told this was our username and login. And up to about 1 week before we changed with them, the about 5years we were with them Username@adsl.ihug.co.nz worked as our email address, could send/recieve quite perfectly.

Ragnor: Also I recommend never rely on ISP email addresses, registering a domain is cheap and easy (under $35 per year). Then get some cheap hosting ($5 per month) or even using google apps for domains standard (which is free, 25gb space per account) for your mail services. You then have total control over your own email addresses, anything@yourdomain.co.nz etc.

That is actually a really good point to think about :)

I don't think it's really worth going to the disputes tribunal either, but at the same time I don't want them getting away with it, I mean it won't be just me that they are cheating.

Detruire

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#212732 6-May-2009 00:53

You can easily get a .com/.net/.info for <$20NZ/year (if you use an overseas registrar).

However, there are always people who'd rather use the ISP email address (even if they know that they'll be changing ISPs in around a year =S )

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Batman

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#212735 6-May-2009 01:07

hey this may make sense. i have had that problem too! i schedule my download (legal stuff like windows updates, windows 7 rc1, but mainly ps3 demos) between 1 am and 7 am and do our utmost best to not use data outside those hours and guess what - i hit 80% in just a week. i thought some other people in our house was using data but they denied it. so what shall i do?!!

anyone experiencing the same problem?

hellonearthisman

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#212739 6-May-2009 02:34

They have an api that would let you see you data usage. http://www.slingshot.co.nz/MyAccount/api

There is also a usage application that uses this to record your usage http://forums.slingshot.co.nz/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=2422

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bazzer

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#212755 6-May-2009 08:03

joker97: hey this may make sense. i have had that problem too! i schedule my download (legal stuff like windows updates, windows 7 rc1, but mainly ps3 demos) between 1 am and 7 am and do our utmost best to not use data outside those hours and guess what - i hit 80% in just a week. i thought some other people in our house was using data but they denied it. so what shall i do?!!
anyone experiencing the same problem?

Off topic, sorry, but wondering how you schedule your PS3 downloads?

Jord

4 posts

Wannabe Geek

#212761 6-May-2009 08:21

joker97: hey this may make sense. i have had that problem too! i schedule my download (legal stuff like windows updates, windows 7 rc1, but mainly ps3 demos) between 1 am and 7 am and do our utmost best to not use data outside those hours and guess what - i hit 80% in just a week. i thought some other people in our house was using data but they denied it. so what shall i do?!!
anyone experiencing the same problem?

Exactly the same issue as us :(

Batman

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#212770 6-May-2009 08:54

Off topic, sorry, but wondering how you schedule your PS3 downloads?

erm ... dodgy manual labour! i stay up till 1am and hit download queue GO! and make it shut off when done. or if i wake up at 6am i download till 6.58am and stop.

yeah, sorry that's what i meant by schedule, but the human way!

i find the data track app not too helpful as there are 3 computers doing their own thing. also i still can't tell with this app whether they're 'COUNTING' off peak data in the data cap as i dont know what the other guys are doing. i'd hate to jeopardise relationships by accusing but seriously our data is going down very fast when no one claims to be using anything.

Jord

4 posts

Wannabe Geek

#212877 6-May-2009 15:51

joker97: i'd hate to jeopardise relationships by accusing but seriously our data is going down very fast when no one claims to be using anything.

I feel exactly the same way, there has to be something dodgy going on slingshots end.

But what can we do about it? Other than paying the fee for breaking the contract and go somewhere else.

Batman

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#212885 6-May-2009 16:28

well we're coming out of contract in august. i am seriously considering jumping ship back to telecom - they've never given us any trouble, true to their word, very fast speed all (well most of) the time, and very good customer service. hopefully there'll be a very cool promotion like 6 mths free or something then!! hee hee

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computeruser

32 posts

Geek

#212930 6-May-2009 19:46

Have been with Slingshot for over 3 years, although I never checked it at my end, I always had a feeling that some how my data caps seems to disappear very quickly, do remember that in the case of Torrents, your upload is counted as data as well and with full speed
you will be moving data quiet fast.
Just my 2c worth of opinion....