Packet loss/massive ping spikes in BR2 area

[CiaranGarden]

Again the internet in the BR2 area provided by Virgin has turned to crap, it barely seems to have more than a reliable month or 2 before going bad again for the last 6-7 years.

For the last 3-4 weeks pretty much the entire day the internet has had close to 50% packet loss which has made online gaming impossible, because it often leads to upwards of 6-10 second delays on every action . It's gotten so bad, its affecting work meetings too, my voice often cuts out for full sentences due to this packet loss/overloaded traffic problem in my area (On secure ethernet connection). Please fix!! 

[jbrennand]

Is it a "known problem" they are working on?

As well as trying the “check service,” Area status webpage" (link at top right of this forum), also try the “free & automated” Service Status number - 0800 561 0061 - which usually gives the most up to date info. and tells you of more local issues down to postcode level. These may not be listed on the Area Status web page (Areas are not “Geographic” they are billing areas) as that usually only covers faults affecting 1000’s of customers) so phone may give you more info, but even that wont cover problems affecting just a few customers.

See if there is any info there.

In the meantime... If you haven’t already, set up a free and secure “Broadband Quality Monitor” to continually monitor the state of your connection and record any true network dropouts , latency issues, packet drops, etc - it will thus allow you to differentiate between those and simple wifi dropouts. It does it 24/7/365 and it keeps a visual record of any/all of your network disconnections, useful data to have to match to the Network logs (in your Hub settings) and also in discussions with VM - note it will take a few hours to start seeing a sensible picture - post up the “link” to the “share live graph” (as per instructions on the TB website) when it starts to develop.

https://www.thinkbroadband.com/broadband/monitoring/quality

[CiaranGarden]

No there are no known issues, and doing service checks shows it as fine because the connection is still there. It just has short but frequent complete cut-outs and packet losses. 

Thanks for that, I've setup a BQM now. However, since issues like this have been going on and off for the last 8 years in my area (across multiple different routers, superhubs, different devices and wifi+ethernet) I don't see it being fixed sadly. Friend 1 road away also gets the exact same problem so its not local just to my house.

It's just unfortunate this month's problem has felt worse than anything else in the last 8 years. Fully cutting out of loading websites/messages as well as in conference calls at the moment - before it was only really noticeable in gaming! Well over 50% loss and full disconnections (30 seconds no signal) are common at the moment 😞

[Steven_L]

Hey @CiaranGarden,

Thanks for taking the time to post on our forums about this issue.

I have been able to locate your account via your community profile and have found that there is a congestion issue on the network in your area that is currently due to be resolved on 13th May at 14:30.

This will be the cause of the issues that you're having and we hope to get this sorted as soon as we can.

Regards

Steven_L

Regards

Steven_L

[jbrennand]

Ciaran, post up the BQM link to share live graph.

Steven said its a congestion issue. See this thread re. over-utilisation and Andrew’s comments in Message 4

https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Networking-and-WiFi/Jitter-and-latency/m-p/4609932#M378967

[CiaranGarden]

Here's a live link to the BQM 

https://www.thinkbroadband.com/broadband/monitoring/quality/share/f1f1cec4e91e225f2b9ece9c3b9a7b5ee26ca9f0

 It seems like even late at night after 2am the ping spikes can be quite significant

[CiaranGarden]

Hi Steven, thanks for letting me know. I'm just hoping this fix might be the one that stops the last 8 years of problems. Usually, it seems to go terrible again shortly after a fix due to the overutilisation problems in the area.

I don't know why speed increases keep being made to packages in the BR2 area when the infrastructure clearly can't handle it! Every new set of speed increases seems to overburden the traffic so much that its at maximum levels for almost all of the working day. Haven't been able to have a single meeting today without a disconnection, no mind having no way to play online games at all.

It seems the infrastructure itself of the cabling in the roads around here needs replacing rather than a bandaid "fix" a couple of times a year

[Katie_WT]

Cheers for popping back @CiaranGarden

This current congestion issue was raised around 4th Feb this year. At the time of writing, the estimated fix date is still showing as 13th May 2021. The reference number for the issue is F008782151 and I have logged this against your account for you also. 

I have also had a few checks of your Hub and can see that it's not been rebooted in around 41 days; I would advise giving it a reboot when you have a moment as this may help stabilise things for you in the meantime. The congestion issue is only intermittent. 

Congestion issues can take a while to fix as we need to investigate where the issue originates and then how best to restore without causing more disruption to our customers. New cabling is usually needed and with this comes permits and permissions from the Local Authority - all of which can take time to get authorised. 

I can only apologise about your ongoing issues over the past few years; please do feel free to pop back to this thread if you require an update on the area issue

Cheers

[CiaranGarden]

Hi Katie, thanks for another update. What I'm trying to say with this is that any fixes for similar over-congestion issues over the past several years have never seemed to be sufficient to prevent another failure. It seems like a full re-cabling of the roads in the area is required to get over these problems, because the old network just can't handle modern speeds, because everything else Virgin has tried over these years hasn't worked.

And I know it can be possible is partly what is frustrating, I was a happy Virgin customer in Birmingham for 3 years with a similar speed internet package in a dense area. The whole time there were no issues whatsoever with ping or packet loss, so I feel what is necessary is a proper upgrade to the BR2/Bromley area specifically otherwise each fix is just kicking the can further down the road.

I don't know how much authority you have on the forum team, but I'm just asking to pass on my concerns to someone who might be able to take affirmative action to fix this area in particular. I've used virgin in many different places across the years without issue, except the main place I've lived!

Cheers.

[lotharmat]

The BQM looks pretty good now!

Does it always look like that - Totally awful and then decent?