LIME responds to internet speed petition

| 22/06/2015 | 23 Comments

(CNS Business): An online petition is circulating throughout Cayman demanding “decent internet” on the island. Local campaigner Sandra Catron started the petition and said it’s time to mandate that customers actually receive the broadband internet speeds they are paying for.

Catron is calling on members of the Legislative Assembly and leaders at the Information & Communications Technology Authority (ICTA) to help in the petition, stating that the law should allow for “monetary infractions” to be made against the ISPs (internet service providers) in the Cayman Islands. She told CNS Business that she started this petition after hearing numerous complaints.

Go to petition

“I have been appalled at internet speeds persons are getting compared to what they are actually paying for. In some instances we have seen people paying for ‘fibre’ from providers and getting less than 2MB and not able to stream online content,” Catron explained.

However, she noted this isn’t the first time she’s tried to take a stand on the matter.

Cayman News Service“Three years ago I was posting on social media about the same issue and nothing has been done as yet. Consumers continue to pay top dollar for these services but we are not getting any guarantees for that money. I think it’s time that the government protects it’s citizens against such poor business practices and implement some sort of penalty regime for companies that are consistently not delivering on internet speeds,” she stated.

CNS Business investigated if local internet providers were having difficulties providing top quality speeds to their customers.

“The island is in the middle of the Caribbean, but we try to make this one of the best connected countries in the world,” promised LIME CEO Bill McCabe. “From a network perspective, and from a country perspective, we’re incredible well connected and well served.”

The CEO told CNS Business 60% of LIME customers have 10Mbps (megabytes per second) or above right now, and 90% of customers can get 25Mbps or above.  Although, McCabe doesn’t deny, like anything else, there can be issues.

“People will have problems. There are problems with copper lines in some places that may be old, or the wiring in the house may not be up to date, but we encourage people to come in and talk to us and we can run some tests and get a technician out there if they don’t think they are enjoying the sort of speeds they should be,” he said.

McCabe explained that there are certain tests a customer can run in their own home to check their speeds.

“First and for most you need to make sure there are not multiple devices attached by a hardwire or by WiFi to the modem,” he said. “If you have 10Mbps at home, that is shared amongst the devices you are using. So if you’re streaming Netflix on the TV and you’ve got three mobile phones and a computer attached, then they will share that 10Mbps.”

McCabe said the best way to run a test to check your internet speed is to “hardwire into the back of your modem and then go to speedtests.net, pick the server that is on the island, which is LIME George Town speed test server, and that will give you a really good idea of what the speed is.”

However, Catron feels there needs to be a stronger approach to address customer concerns.

“I don’t mind a small variance but when you are only getting 1/3 of what you’re paying for, we need consumer protection in this regard,” she stated.

CNS Business also reached out to ICTA Managing Director Alee Fa’amoe, who stated, “The authority welcomes feedback and input from consumers regarding the service they receive from licensees. In fact, one of our Strategic Objectives is to protect customers.”

A recent survey by ICT Pulse, which tracks information and communication technology issues in the Caribbean, listed the Cayman Islands as a region with one of fastest connection speeds, but also with some of the most expensive service. The survey showed Cayman has the second-highest download speed at 300 megabits per second, followed behind Barbados, with the highest connection speed in the Caribbean at 320 Mbps.

Tags: , , ,

Category: Featured, ICT, Technology, Video

Comments (23)

Trackback URL | Comments RSS Feed

  1. Sharkey says:

    I see and understand what is happening with Lime providing some services , and charging for service they can’t supply to the consumer demand . I really think that this issue should be taken to Government and demand for this issue to be resolved, or get a good Attorney and start a class action law suit against Lime. It sounds like a lot of the people that commented on this issue could be a lot of good help to the attorney with your knowledge and expertise.

  2. Anonymous says:

    How come lime will not honor their agreements with overseas carriers
    I used to be able to call any phone in Cayman from my tracfone in the US for just under 2 cents per minute
    I was able to call lime cell phones until 2 weeks ago then they stopped letting the calls go thru now it is just a busy signal
    I spent hours with tracfone trying to figure out the problem
    called other numbers landlines etc with tracfone supervising the calls every call worked except the lime cell phone #’s that were tried. The calls are being blocked by LIME
    Tracfone is at a loss that LIME will not honor their agreements and Lime knows nothing can be done about it
    CRIMINALS
    Its the third world mentality of being able to get away with bad behavior that is ruining Cayman

  3. Anonymous says:

    This petition would actually mean something if it was championed by someone with public credibility. Certainly more than 80 people believe they should be given access to service they pay for.

  4. Rp says:

    Valid concern about the quality of telecom and pricing offered locally Sandra. However, I would prefer that the LA focuses on more important matters for the moment. Finances, Dump, airport etc.

    If I look at my household expenses internet speed is not an immediate concern. The price of electricity, water (if you happen to have landscaping) and gasoline should be looked at first by the LA as the current monopolies are taking us to the cleaners.

    • Anonymous says:

      This petition isn’t about the price of your internet but instead about getting what you actually pay for. BIG difference and a concern to many.

    • Anonymous says:

      But the problem is; Govt. is spending energy / resources on foolishness like setting up yet another Board….this time to rate films / movies??

  5. naugaracin says:

    With these guys (Lime, Logic. etc.), you are paying top dollar for a mediocre service.
    Lime’s upload rate is also one of the lowest of them all. For example, a 10meg service will give you (as long as the moon and the planets align) 10mb/s down and 512kb/s up. Seriously Lime??

    With so many people uploading files and using cloud services, an upload rate of 512kb/s is a no-no. Logic at least offers symmetrical bandwidths with their service, even though you have to pay top dollar for their crappy service as well.

    Time for all customers on island to get what they are paying for and for the ICTA to slap some serious fines to these unscrupulous internet service providers.

  6. Anonymous says:

    This is definitely an island wide problem and not just with LIME. The problem is really a lack of broadband capacity at peak internet times. Most of the internet providers on island do not have the capacity to meet peak internet demands, and in many cases, they have oversold their broadband capacity. My experience has mainly been with Logic. I have their fastest internet fiber plan – 25Mbps of download speed. Now when I run speeds tests at off peak internet times (early morning), my internet is screaming where I’m getting speeds between 20-25Mbps. However, in the evenings and weekends when internet traffic is heavy, sometimes I only get as much as 2-3Mbps. Now that becomes a serious problem for streaming and very frustrating when you’re paying for 25Mbps and only getting about 10% of the speed. Everyone knows that internet speeds can varying at times and I certainly don’t expect perfection. But what I do expect is fairness and a reasonable expectation of the internet speed I’m paying for. For me, if I got at least 15Mbps or 60% of the 25Mbps speed I’m paying for at all times, then I’d be happy. I think if internet companies cannot demonstrate that they can at least meet 60% of internet speed demand at all times, then they need to be held accountable. If they can’t meet a certain threshold test, then they either need to acquire more broadband capacity or stop overselling their capacity. They should also be honest with customers when demand cannot be met to a certain capacity and reduce their fees accordingly. The ICTA cannot allow internet providers to continue to oversell their broadband capacity to customers, to continue to make false promises about their internet speeds, and to continue to overcharge customers when they cannot meet a certain level of demand with their current broadband capacity. While I would be hopeful the ICTA would take an active interest in the problem, I’m less optimistic that they actually have the resources to monitor and enforce this problem.

  7. Anonymous says:

    I paid for 104 megabit service with LIME when their fibre first came out, which equates to 13 megabytes per second. When I got the service the speed was ~10 megabytes per second which was very acceptable. Then 4G mobile broadband was given to every TD&H for FREE and my 10 megabytes dropped to 2 or 3 and never recovered. I was paying a full $208 CI for this very highest speed available and getting the same speed as someone paying $110. It was obvious to me what happened, all the capacity provided by the new submarine cable was used both for fibre and 4G so LIME could market/sell both and not deliver on either. Now they are advertising a 300 megabit service which equates to 37.5 megabytes. Does anyone seriously think they can actually provide that speed? Of course not. So YES we need consumer protection for this. LIME, if you want to sell speeds like this, put your money where your ads are and lay another cable. You don’t get to give away for free what others are paying an arm and a leg to receive.

    While I’m at it, I never received the ‘faster wireless router’ that can transmit the higher speeds, either, despite asking twice. And a direct call to Bill McCabe’s PA did not get me any resolution of any of these issues whatsoever! Talk about an unaccountable company.

  8. Anonymous says:

    I am an advent gamer…on Sunday they do something to the routing that changes the connection from Miami to Somewhere in south america or PR. You go from playing with English speaking players with decent Ping Times to Spanish Speaking players with horrible ping times. Its not just the connection speed but also the routing that effects the connection. Sunday is when the home consumer is using the internet..stop messing it up for us gamers.

    • Pogo says:

      Think your complaint should be aimed at the game hosts not LIME – its not as if LIME reroutes through South America, or South Americans magically jump onto LIMEs fibre you know. They are simply offering a connection to a portal offered by the games company – if the games company switches hosting to their Latin American portal that is hardly LIMEs fault. You may as well blame them for not teaching the other gamers English. LIMEs customer service sucks, but this one is not their fault.

      • Anonymous says:

        obviously you have no idea about routing. LIME has confirmed that they use least cost routing…they control the direction of the traffic. Try using traceroute and you will see that it changes throughout the day and weekends…sometimes it goes though 10 routers to get to a server…other times only 2-3 times. Every time the data goes though a router it is slowed down. Do not just assume you have knowledge and do your research before you criticize someone.

    • Anonymous says:

      Get a life. Go outside and play

    • Avid Poster says:

      You only game at Christmas time?

  9. Anonymous says:

    Thank God for this petition. The issue is widespread but as usual people will complain about it but not sign the petition. Typical island mentality to be honest!

  10. Alltalk Ebanks says:

    I’m sure all the service providers are shaking in their boots at this pathetic 89 signature petition, with duplicates.

  11. Anonymous says:

    Lime is complete crap. Wiring in the house my *ss. Trying to get a technician to fix anything is a joke. The entire company is a joke. What a bunch of bull excuses.

  12. Anonymous says:

    Good glad some one is bringing this to the for front!!

  13. JP says:

    If you are unhappy with the LIME service then try Logic, C3, or Digicel. The variance in speeds is no different than that in the US. My FiOS from Verizon should have been 100 but sometimes it’s 60 or 70. You are paying for speeds up to 10 that means at times you might see 4, 6, or 8. Cayman has many other service providers on this island…

  14. Shonari says:

    One thing that often gives people confusion is the difference between a Megabyte (MB) (used for file size) and a Megabit (Mb) (used for download speeds). People often assume that a download speed of 1 Megabit per second (1 Mbps) will allow them to download a 1 Megabyte file in one second. This is not the case, a Megabit is 1/8 as big as a Megabyte, meaning that to download a 1MB file in 1 second you would need a connection of 8Mbps. The difference between a Gigabyte (GB) and a Gigabit (Gb) is the same, with a Gigabyte being 8 times larger than a Gigabit.

    • Anonymous says:

      People who do not understand the difference are too stupid to have a view on this topic. There are only 10 sorts of people in the world. Those that understand binary and those that don’t.

  15. Anonymous says:

    Hello

    You last paragraph stated 300 megabits. Thats not right original article but us at 25 Mbps (but also one of the highest charged) see here: http://www.ict-pulse.com/2014/05/snapshot-2014-update-internet-speeds-pricing-caribbean/

Please include your email address in the form below if you are using your real name. You can use a pseudonym, with or without leaving an email address, or just leave the form blank to be "Anonymous". All comments will be moderated before they are published. The CNS Comment Policy is at the top of this page.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.