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unlimited internet

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wullie1967

Member
hi just found out from my 3 network that my unlimited internet doesnt really mean unlimited its actually 2gb and they say its called fair usage and al fone companys have this can anyone verify this please
 
Yep all of the UK phone companies are illiterate and dont understand what the word "unlimited" means.

Fair usage is bullshit IMO, its a hard download cap in nearly all cases and should be advertised as that.
 
cheers for quick reply guys it was a shock to me i used 4 gb first month i got fone but they didnt charge me they let me off i will need to watch
 
I'm on an O2 unlimited data and wi-fi deal (pre 24th June) and have no idea what their fair usage is - someone told me 3gb, O2 when ordering said there was no cap.

Now I think there's is 500mb.
 
Yup, none of the phone companies understand what unlimited means. I actually thought O2 was 500mb *unlimited* before, but it may have been 750mb or 1gb. I never found a definitive answer when I was looking for it but, had read it before.

2GB is pretty damn good. Cuz the other networks, it is 500mb or 1GB :(. Yup, that's unlimited 8-). What if i want to download some apps when im out and about? Nope, not allowed :|. Well, it is but, will use up the bandwidth.
 
'Unlimited' data comes from the same kind of people who sell you 500 gigabyte hard drives with only 460 gigabytes of usable space. Someone needs a successful lawsuit against this stuff as an example to other marketing idiots.

Having said that, you'd know the data limit if you had read the terms and conditions of the contract, which is always a good thing to do really. So both parties are to blame.
 
Phenomenological said:
'Unlimited' data comes from the same kind of people who sell you 500 gigabyte hard drives with only 460 gigabytes of usable space. Someone needs a successful lawsuit against this stuff as an example to other marketing idiots.

Having said that, you'd know the data limit if you had read the terms and conditions of the contract, which is always a good thing to do really. So both parties are to blame.
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That's a really bad example because every HD has a percentage of it's space unusable. I think it's used for some sort of hard drive stuff (somebody else has to clarify)

Back on topic though can somebody please explain what ''fair usage'' means? I don't see how you can advertise something as unlimited and then cap it. I actually got really confused when I looked at some wireless connection deals the other day. They literally had the words ''unlimited'' and ''limited'' next to each other.
 
wullie1967 said:
hi just found out from my 3 network that my unlimited internet doesnt really mean unlimited its actually 2gb and they say its called fair usage and al fone companys have this can anyone verify this please
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i think you'll find three actually only give 1gb of internet allowance.
 
i think "unlimited" means that... once you go over your download limit, you can still use the internet, but you pay extra on top.

Here is Australia, we have unlimited internet broadband, which means once we pass our limit, we get slower internet....its the same with phones, once you pass your cap, you have to pay erxtra...


limited will mean, when u download everything, you have no more internet.....
 
DMXXX said:
That's a really bad example because every HD has a percentage of it's space unusable. I think it's used for some sort of hard drive stuff (somebody else has to clarify)
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I agree with that 100%. You can't compare this with so-called "unlimited" data plans - they are two completely different things.

If you're on a capped data plan, (i.e. if they actually say "you have this much data to download per month"), this typically means that once you hit that figure you won't be able to download any more. However, with an "unlimited" data plan that's subject to a "fair use policy", exceeding your monthly limit will just result in a letter saying something along the lines of "stop taking the piss", obviously in a nicer way than that!

I'm with T-Mobile, on the lowest spec "Web n' Walk" package and am constantly downloading stuff, and have never had the letter. :cool:
 
I'm on 3 in Sweden and all they say is that I will get throttled as soon as I pass over 10 GB per month (and I hardly ever go over 1 GB).

The good part is that I believe that wifi tethering is considered fair usage, as it's part of the phone's services.

Tim
 
People on this forum don't know how to take an analogy. :rolleyes:

And incidentally it's not stuff they put on the hard drive, some companies use 1000 megabytes in a gigabyte for their calculations instead of 1024 so they can advertise a larger capacity than they have. They also round up the capacity of their drives instead of quoting the proper figure. Which makes it similar false advertising to spraying the word 'Unlimited' all over the place. I wasn't comparing the situations, I was comparing the type of people who advertised the products and the crap they talk, if you read the wording of my post properly. ;) Hard drives should be advertised by usable space to the nearest gigabyte, not rounded up to the nearest convenient figure.
 
nickarcher said:
I'm on an O2 unlimited data and wi-fi deal (pre 24th June) and have no idea what their fair usage is - someone told me 3gb, O2 when ordering said there was no cap.

Now I think there's is 500mb.
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02's 'fair usage' for data is 500mb like with most companies. I pay that extra
 
Actually Phenomenological, the disk guys are "right". Kilo means 1,000 and Mega means 1,000,000 in SI units so a kilobyte is 1,000 bytes and a megabyte is 1,000,000. There are binary equivalents "kibi" and "mebi" which actually mean 1,024 and 1,048,576 bytes which should be used but, historically computer-folks started using the "wrong" terms. We should be using kibibyte and mebibyte (gibibyte, tebibyte, etc.) but as they sound so lame we stick to the "wrong" ones.

I hate this fact, but I can't argue it's correctness - blame the IEC.

In the same way I can understand carriers putting a limit on data-use as their infrastructure isn't up to providing "unlimited" to everyone. I'd like them to rename the data plans, though, as "unlimited" means just that.
 
Unlimited in the UK just means you will warned and not charged if you go over their fair use. If you repeatedly go over they will move you to a capped data plan.

Unlimited plans will soon be extinct same as streaming media over 3g is on the way out, the 3g network just cannot keep up with the booming smartphone market.
 
Going back to the orginal question, the data allowance on '3' seems to vary on who you ask from 500mb in some stores to 1GB when calling the call centre! I finally recieved confirmation by email as to what I have, if you have the Internet Max add on then you have a 2GB and for normal 'unlimited' (in the loosest sence of the word!) you have a 1GB allownce however if you go over this they are unlikely to do anything unless you really hammer it.
Hope this makes some sort of sence!
 
nickarcher said:
Ah right. My girlfriend has an i-phone on O2, coming to the end of an 18 month contract and she uses loads (1.5-2gb) and is fine.
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The iphone contracts have different allowances.

By all means check! If its not 500mb its better for all of us! ^^
 
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