Peeved with Telkom’s Uncapped LTE? There’s a new fair-use policy and an escape clause

Ah, the old bait and switch. Telkom rolled out “uncapped” LTE to boost usage on its mobile infrastructure, but tacked on a pretty draconian fair-use policy (FUP) that had some consumers feeling like they’d been had. Now Telkom’s done a very welcome about turn and decided to revise it’s FUP to something a little more, well, fair. Moreover, if you think the LTE uncapped service isn’t delivering as expected, you can now cancel your contract without needing to sell a kidney to pay it off.

“We understand that quality data connectivity is in high demand our new FUP reflects our understanding of this,” says Telkom spokesperson, Jacqui O’Sullivan. “We have made every effort to ensure that customers receive a quality data experience. However, in instances where existing LTE Uncapped customers may have requirements beyond what we can cater for on this specific LTE product, we would like to engage these customers on alternate products better suited to their needs. We are also willing to release these customers impacted by the FUP from their existing contracts without any penalty.”

In other words, if you find you need a genuinely uncapped connection, or someones now offering fibre to your premises where previously LTE was the best you could do, it might be time to cancel your LTE uncapped contract and move on. Of course, if LTE is still the best solution on the table you’re stuck between a rock and an internetless place. So, about that updated FUP…

“Effective immediately, customers making use of the LTE Uncapped product will receive an additional 100GB of full-speed data per month,” the company says in a release put out on Tuesday afternoon. “This means that customers would have to use in excess of 300GB of data per month before Telkom’s FUP will be applied.”

Previously, users were throttled to barely useable speeds once they hit 200GB, a limit anyone with a Netflix or ShowMax addiction, a desire to watch YouTube in glorious HD, or teenagers on Snapchat will tell you is remarkably easy to reach and breach.

Telkom says is also included “an additional 50GB data allocation for peer-to-peer services such as BitTorrent and Skype”.

Where customers go over their 300GB allowance, Telkom will throttle speeds for the next 50GB to 4Mbit/s. Exceed that and the next 50GB will trickle down at 2Mbit/s. And thereafter? Well, thereafter you’re presumably booted back to trickle connectivity until the end of the month. But hey, at least it’s going to take longer to get there.