And so it begins...

This is my first blog and it is written in anger. Although it will be infrequent, I will keep it up as long as there is a reason for it. If you have stories about the cheap tricks your Internet provider uses to circumvent your legal rights, let me hear about them. Unfortunately for Demon and their parent Company Thus, they have taken on someone who a) knows enough about the law that he knows a crock when he sees one and b) is prepared to show up this disgraceful behaviour for exactly what it is, a rip-off. It is my experience that many large companies feel that they can just run roughshod over peoples contractual rights (I have previously successfully sued many large companies, including Ikea) because they think that people can't or won't fight back. This is where they are wrong.

If you like this blog, please tell as many people as possible, including on-line social and search sites, so that others will not be ripped off.

I have been a subscriber to Demon Internet since 1996 and have always been happy with their service. Having started out with a dial up account I moved through ISDN to broadband and with that a regular hike in speed to my current 8mb level.

Everything was proceeding normally until January 18th, 2007 when this letter dropped through my letterbox from them. Some of you may have received one of these yourself, if you are a Demon subscriber, or something similar from you own Internet supplier.

"Dear Customer,

At Thus plc, we take great care to ensure a high standard of service is provided to our Home and Home Office broadband customers. We provide this through ongoing performance monitoring of the THUS plc network, including regular analysis of customer bandwidth usage.

While we encourage our customers to take full advantage of the excellent quality of service we offer, we are also obliged to ensure that our service is used in accordance with our Fair Usage Policy, a copy of which can be found at http://www.demon.net/helpdesk/producthelp/aup/thusfup.
This forms part of the Agreement between Thus plc and our Home and HomeOffice customers.

We would like to take this opportunity to remind you that in the circumstances where bandwidth usage exceeds what we consider to be reasonable, it is necessary to take steps to reduce usage to a more equitable level.

Thus plc currently regards 50Gb as being fair a maximum usage [sic] level of downloads during a rolling 30 day period for Home Customers, and 60Gb for Home Office Customers. Please note that these limits are guidelines and may be subject to change without notice.

We are writing to advise that our use analysis shows that over the past 30 days you have downloaded 116.51Gb (their emphasis). Consequently, in accordance with our Fair Usage Policy, we have had to take immediate corrective action.

With effect from 19/01/2007 (again, their emphasis) your download speed will be limited to 128kbps between the hours of 9am and 10pm for a 30 day period. After this period you will be returned to normal speeds, unless you have continued to exceed the maximum usage levels for your service, in which case you will be restricted for a further 30 days. No limitations will apply outside these times. You will be able to use the maximum download speed that your line will support. Upstream speeds will not be limited at any time.

Following this period of restriction, THUS plc will continue to monitor bandwidth usage and you continue to exceed the levels we deem acceptable, as outlined above, it may be necessary to restrict your usage again. However, having brought this matter to your attention, we hope that you will be able to reduce your bandwidth usage and further restrictions in the future will not be required.

May I take this opportunity to thank you for your custom, and offer my apologies for any inconvenience that this may cause. If you have any questions relating to this matter, please contact our Customer Services team on 0845 2722333.

Yours Sincerely

Demon Customer Services."

Frankly, I was disgusted, and more importantly, I believed that what they were doing fell outside of contract law. The temptation was to phone the number and start ripping into their customer services team, but I knew that wasn't going to get me anywhere, after all they are just people like me, trying to do a reasonable job of work, under difficult circumstances that Thus was making worse for them. I hold my hat out to them, they must have received some serious abuse after these bombshells hit the doormat.

My first port of call was the web link that was provided in the letter. There is no indication on that page of what is expected by their customers to meet "fair use". Furthermore, if you go to their link under "A practical guide to the FUP can be found on" you will see that you are presented with no reference to the FUP at all. Finally, if you look under 8Mbps Upgrade FAQ, there is some writing there (I won't refer to it as detail as that would be untrue).

My next post will tell you what I did next and my philosophy is, don't get mad get even.