Sorry to hear about your problem but here in the USA we also have to pay for using the internet.

In South Africa as well, it is not expensive but also sometimes slow, because we live on a farm and is outside the normal Residential areas for coverage and there for it is sometimes S L O W but I rather wait to be in here with all the Cuties than not at all lol

The only think I can think of is if you have a wireless router connection that don't have a password on it and someone is using your service. It can be such an aggravation dealing with the customer service people.

Alice, because today is a Public Holiday you may have got someone that does not know much. Try tomorrow you might get better results. Marg

I live in USA and do pay for my monthly usage but a
flat fee not on a minute usage basis. I probably could get a cheaper deal but my email is attached and I don't want to switch-it would be a pain.
I have DSL and its supposed to be fast but I think
its slow as molasses. Go Figure.
Good Luck sorting it all out.

Wow, that sounds awful. I pay a flat fee to AT&T each month no matter how much I use it. I have their DSL Extreme 6 service and it is very fast. When my sister is here she can't believe how fast it is. My internet shares my phone line now so I was able to cancel my extra phone line that use to be just for internet.

I can tell I am fortunate to be where I am with good internet service.

Does the usage they charge you pertain to your website or is that hosted separately? If it is your website perhaps more people are visiting this month than last. Could that be it?

Can you get Telstra to give you the IP addresses that made up that 15gb of usage for the first 11 days. You can then check to see who the IP addresses belong to. I think if Telstra is going to charge you that way they have to prove the usage to you in an acceptable fashion.

Marcelle

I remember when the internet first came out they used to do that here in USA, but now you get unlimited access with just about all the internet connections here, unless you actually by a "card" with so many minutes on it. Hope you get this resolved as I know with a business you depend on the internet... Hugs, T

That's bad. (And I hate those "fair use" flat-rate contracts. Luckily, I'm not on one. Couldn't, as my job requires daily fast internet access.)
However, there is chance that you've caught some "nasty" programm which does a lot of internet traffic without letting you know. What OS are you using? If Win7, have you checked the "Resource Monitor"? (In the START menu type "resource monitor" and you should find the program. It has a "Network" tab which allows you to check what program (or process) is currently using the net and to what extend. Very useful to identify "unwanted" network-programs. Unfortunately, it will not have a "log" of the the past, but I'd advice you to keep an eye to it. A virus/spybot etc. may easily steal you internet time by making all sorts of "online stuff" in the background. The same is try for file-sharing (torrent) software, because YOU provide the server for all others to download you shared files. Similar things happen, btw, with Skype. The software is great, but it is also a leech. If you keep using it for longer, you bandwidth is (also) used for other people's phonecalls. I also recommand that you turn OFF your PC once in a while.

Hi Alice, been wondering where you were! Now I know. I have to use a satellite broadband[live too far away from a Telsta exchange] It's not too bad, but not as quick as ADSL would be.

I know the feeling we also pay for data and obviously your contracts for speed is more expensive. I use anything between 4gig and 8gig (that is if the children allow me to borrow their data 3G modems - I only have 4gig for which I pay about aus$50 and to go over that is pretty expensive) per month. It happened once that overnight I've used more than 1,5gig only to realize later that my computer was set to automatic updates which caused the usage. I use a iMac desktop and don't even use the garage band or safari browser and those programmes also updated. First thing was to switch it to manual and now I choose to update.

I will not deal with Telstra. My son in Brisbane has bought a new Computer - before Christmas and also with Telstra. He has has not been able to get onto the Net since he bought the Computer.

I am so glad I have a flat rate charge. I am dreading to think what it woulds cost me. My internet is never switched off!

They keep considering that in the USA but so far they haven't done it. If you get Satellite Internet, like Wild Blue, that's how they charge theirs, by the speed and usage.
If you suddenly go up in usage, it may be from a virus or file sharing programs you may not realize are on the computer and using your allotment. Also, kids home at Christmas can do that!

We have to pay in Germany also but I ahve a flatrate for internet and phone. It is always funny when our supplier rings up with new offers and wants to sell us a call rate with high-speed that we could not use because we have not the cable here in our part of the town ;o) Same with a special offer for home-entertainment by call; my husband would love to take it but it is only available in the other part of our small commuity :o(
Greetings, Bettina

This sounds to me like the Christmas/January period we were visiting our daughter in Arizona. When we arrived home we had a bill for over 800 phone calls, made during our absence - from my computer phone line in our closed-up house.
Thing is when I go away I unplug everything and disconnect the computers and sewing machines to avoid storm damage.
That took some explaining to the powers that be but we did win in the end.
Eventually they found out it was a fault in one of the phone line connections along the road. We are out of town which generally equates to out of sight out of mind.

Dig your heels in, Alice, and don't be fobbed off.

Now we have satellite broadband connection and use Activ8.
AlmaG.

I pay a flat fee to

I also have ADSL from Telkom SA and I have a flat rate. I have never had any problems with my gb usage. It is not as quick as at the beginning, but quite satisfactory. Hope you can sort through your problems. **

I feel your pain as I'm with them as well (wireless) .. I hate that they count both uploads AND downloads in your gig allowance. I've had to turn off all automatic updates because they just chew too much into my allowance. My parents use Vista and most of their monthly allowance is sucked up by just the operating system's updates.

I hate dealing with them: It took 2 hours to activate the sim .. the first guy hung up when I told him I didn't have a phone so I was calling him from a public phone.. very rude indeed. I wish you much better luck in your next phone call with them :) xXx

They are going that way here in the US too. Particularly for all the smart phones that can stream video from the internet. Eats gigabytes of data apparently. The internet providers want to charge by the gigabyte here and it's coming because everyone is dropping cable TV to watch video streaming on Netflix, and that demands more gigabytes.

Hi Alice, I too had problems with telstra, and have changed to optus and is much better...hope you get someone to talk to today...tues maybe someone with more knowledge...Hugs Sally

I believe that they would have to have "hind sight" to see that.
We pay for internet but the speed depends entirely on your server and you determine the plan/price/speed you wish to pay for which service. Hope you get the issue resolved soon.

gosh Alice I really feel for you.. and others reading your comments, here in the UK I have unlimited internet for a flat fee, our fees depend on how fast we want the speed and the availability, I also have a wireless router in my home with upto 4 other users using the broadband at the same time, I have 3 children still at home either on their laptops or on the ps3 games.. I do certainly get my monies worth.. as i pay a flat fee of £15.00 per month including my phone line which has free landline calls during off peak times, plus I get free ditital TV...( I do have the option to suscribe to premium chanels but I choose not to)
But I am in the London area So I wonder if that makes a difference.. also we are currently region by region switching off our analogue tv changing over to digital only.. apparently our mobile phone companies will then bid for this analogue space.. as its faster then the wi-fi.. we have the changeover in april 2012.
Big hugs from London and a virgin media customer
Maria xx

There must be something amiss with your usage. If your website isn't included.

Can you add some broadband wiring in your house in order to get it? I thought your other house was close by so the outside wiring shouldn't be a problem.

I hope you get to the bottom of this soon. No need to pay for something that you shouldn't owe.

One other thought is they could be charging more for peak usage times.

Marcelle

Alice, when you get this sorted. ask about the Telstra bundle, 200gb downloads plus phone calls. local, std, and calls to telstra mobiles for $128 a month.there are other bundles but this one is right for us and i never use any where near that amount of downloads. this has been cheaper than the plan we had before. anyone thinking of changing be careful of the first bill make sure you get the first one before making lots a phone calls as you can end up with a huge bill before this plan kicks in.