Toucan Broadband Speed Problem

[gannerm]

I stupidly signed-up for Toucan's "up to 8Mbps" broadband back in March. I only ever got a connection of 1.1 Mbps. I have been playing email tennis with their Indian support guys for 6 months now and got nowhere. They occasionally phone me and ask the same questions and we get nowhere. BT have inspected the line outside and inside the house and found no problem. Last week my connection speed suddenly dropped to 192Kbps. I think they must be in breach of contract as they are failing to provide the service that I'm paying for so I should be able to request a MAC code and move to someone else. Does anyone know if my theory is correct or do I need to pay for a solicitor to go through the contract?
I'd be interested to hear from anyone else with similar problems with Toucan or other ISP's.

[Ethel]

You are getting what you paid for - UP TO 8mbps. They do not state a minimum speed.

8mbps is the optimum speed and it would be very rare to get that. However, as you are getting a considerably slower speed, probably less than a cheaper tariff, I think you should discuss terminating the contract with them to see what they suggest. Use strong terms.

[Therema]

I can sympathise with you, we were with them last year and had nothing but bother with them about the exact same thing also we kept getting emails stating we were exceeding our download limit and they were puting us on shared bandwidth, my fingers were sore emailling back and getting the same email returned, so i got onto the ombudsman...no joy there either so told them they had till the next months payment was due to get it sorted or i cancel the direct debit and not to look for anymore money from us, anyway we did just that and yeah they sent us a bill, i foned them and told them not to contact us again or we would take them to court and yes they would have the bill for costs, never heard from them again

[gannerm]

Thanks to both of you for your answers. I'd be interested to know from Therema if you managed to get a MAC code so you could move your broadband to another supplier?

[gannerm]

An end (I hope) to this tale...
Toucan support phoned me yesterday and said they had fixed the problem. I reconnected and, as if by magic, I got a connection of 5.4Mbps. The guy said "I had been connected to the wrong port at the exchange". Sounded like a bit of bull***t to me. It took 5 months for them to fix this. I think it was maybe my formal letter of complaint that I sent 2 weeks ago that may have stirred them into action.
I wish OFCOM would do more to sort these dodgy broadband providers out but they don't seem to take any interest/