LIQUID TELECOMMUNICATIONS UGANDA FAIR CUSTOMER POLICY

What is a Fair Use Policy?

As is the case of all broadband services throughout the world, Liquid Telecom’s Customers share the available international bandwidth capacity that connects them to the world.

Liquid Telecom’s statics show that Customers who use data volumes more than the designed package data volumes are at most 5%. More than 95% of the Customers have their usage within the expected usage of the package they subscribe to. To keep the service usable at peak periods, some degree of sharing is inevitable hence the need for a Fair Usage Policy (“FUP” or “Policy”). This Policy is therefore informed from statistical modelling based on the usage patterns of 95% of our Customers.

 

This Policy is implemented on our Broadband systems to ensure equitable access to all Customers of Broadband and  ensure the best possible speeds and performance.

Peak periods are when the largest numbers of Customers are online accessing the Internet, which leads to a high demand for bandwidth capacity and if not managed well, there will be congestion leading to speed degradation. Liquid Telecom has invested in world-class systems that monitor usage of its customers and ensures all customers have access to decent internet speeds. 

To provide a good experience for all of our customers and minimize capacity issues and degradation in network performance, Liquid Telecom’s Broadband management system institutes measures to prevent improper or excessive usage. The measures include, but are not limited to:

• Shaping throughput (adjustment of line speeds depending on demand), prioritizing services utilizing specific ports or communication protocols. This shaping may take place through a series of steps, where continuous excessive usage (or historical excessive usage) may result in increasing restrictive shaping of throughput.
• Direct rate limiting throughput, limiting package speeds in the case of excessive usage.
• A complete termination of service to customers with improper usage, as elaborated below.

This Policy applies to all, intended as well as un-intended excessive and/or improper usage. Example of unintended excessive usage includes viruses, worms, malicious code, or other unknown causes.

Liquid Telecom Fair Use Objectives

Liquid Telecom leads the industry with the most innovative and dynamic bandwidth management system that is engineered to ensure fair access to the internet especially during peak times by varying your speed priority based on both your package and recent usage profile.

As a result, our unique system only applies traffic management to the heaviest Customers in each package class for the shortest period possible when the Liquid Telecom links get full. The vast majority of our Customers never experience any active traffic management being applied to their link, provided they are on a package that is suitable to their usage habits, requirements and they use it reasonably especially during peak periods for the Home packages.

 

Our definition of Home VS Business packages is as below:

Home packages; most Customers are away in the office or at school during peak periods hence minimal usage expected during these times. Characterized by light browsing and moderate streaming during peak times.

Business packages; demand most bandwidth access during peak times and as such will have priority if the bandwidth demand increases during peak times.

Peak times defined as 7am – 7pm.

Liquid Telecom vs the Rest

The following table shows how Liquid Telecom’s Fair Use System and provides a better experience than any of our competitors.

Area	Typical ISP	Liquid Telecom	Good for you
Sharing Capacity	All Customers are placed in a “pipe” and fight for international bandwidth against each other.	Customers are in a unique pipe with prioritized allocation of capacity only limited to package type.	Your usage determines the quality of your link. If unbalanced, it highlights your need to either change usage or change package.
Top Speed	With everyone sharing a pipe, you never get the top speed during peak.	In your own pipe, every customer gets their fair share of the full speed of their package.	When there is no congestion on the network, above 90% of the time your top speeds can be attained
Restricting Activities	Heavy, less important types of traffic like P2P, streaming, videos are limited for all Customers.	All traffic within your pipe is treated equally and defined by the package you select. P2P, streaming and videos for Home packages are better suited outside of peak times for optimum link performance.	With the correct package for your most consistent usage habits, your data performance is not restricted or stringently managed
Limiting and Capping Data	A fixed data cap is applied, and you have to pay more to play more or suffer terrible speeds for rest of the month.	Unlimited, uncapped Internet. Fair use encouraged for Home packages during peak times for optimal performance.	No shock bills or top ups for unlimited package subscribers.
Penalising Heavy Customers	Heavy Customers are thrown into “abusers” pipe and get terrible service until their month rolls over.	When congested, heavy Customers get reduced speeds, allowing other Customers a chance to access bandwidth at faster speeds but only until the congestion ends, or until their consumed volumes are now equivalent to the other Customers on the same packages.	Full speed is restored to you as soon as possible.
			It allows you a chance to correctly gauge your usage and as such you get the best fit package to cater to your needs.

*UNLIMITED packages are defined as such owing to the fact that we will never deny you access to the internet for the duration of your active billing period, however if your speeds have been affected by the Fair Use Policy you will not necessarily be able to carry out the higher bandwidth consuming activities such as streaming, downloading owing to the degraded speeds.

How it Works: -

• Liquid Telecom’s Fair Use Policy system continuously monitors the usage on your link in terms of volumes of download and upload.
• Every package at Liquid Telecom was designed to give descent internet experience and Liquid Telecom continuously monitors usage trends of its customers and closely follows the world trends to make informed business decisions that keep the company providing the best and valuable service to its customers.
• The FUP and Abuse prevention mechanisms monitor subscriber usage continuously and computes usage every hour and over the last 2weeks.
• During off-peak hours, the volume of data you download, or upload has very limited, if any, impact on your speeds. This is the best time for Home packages to do streaming and downloading of video and audio files.
• Your usage is continuously reassessed during the day, and as soon as the system notices a decrease in consumption, speed limitations are removed.
• The amount of data download vs. reduction in speed priority and impact is dependent on your package. Higher speed packages, or those designed for multiple simultaneous Customers i.e. Business packages will have higher priority and therefore less impact during peak periods.
• Peak period is defined to be from about 7am to 7pm during business days.

Package Selection

To enjoy the best service, it is essential to choose a package that is most closely aligned to your usage habits. It is for this reason that we ask you to accurately disclose your intended use prior to signing up for the package so that we can suggest the best fit for you. If you are on a tight budget, you can choose a less expensive option however at times you may not get an optimal experience especially if your usage patterns lean towards downloading larger files and video streaming, what we commonly refer to as P2P protocols.

If it so happens that you choose a package and over time you continuously find yourself in our “shaping bucket” it will be a clear indication that you are not using the best package that fits your current usage patterns. Our customer care Agents can recommend the possible packages that you should upgrade to in order to get a better experience.

Liquid Telecom’s Class of Service

	Home	Business	Corporate
Typical Customer	Single or family usage at home mostly after hours, students, approximately 5 Customers/ devices simultaneously	Small to medium sized businesses	Large businesses or those requiring the highest quality Internet - Direct Internet Access
		Ranging from 3 Customers for entry level packages to 35 Customers for the highest business package	Internet Café’s
Optimized Speed	Speed optimized for evenings, weekends and holidays	Optimized for business hours and applications	Highest speed priority at all times
Account Management	Contact Centre	contact Center / Key Account Manager	Dedicated AM and team
Relative Peak Priority	1 – lowest priority	3 times higher than residential	10 times higher than residential

Liquid Telecom’s Speed Tiers – Superfast Fibre

Home

	Liquid home silver	Liquid Home Gold	Liquid Home Platinum
Typical Number of Customers/devices	Up to 5	Up to 8	Up to 10
Top Speed	Upto 20mbps	Upto 40mbps	Upto 100mbps

Business

	Liquid Office Bronze	Liquid Office Silver	Liquid office Gold
Typical Number of Customers/ devices	Up to 5 Customers,	Up to 10 Customers	Up to 35 Customers
Top Speed	5mbps	10mbps	15mbps

Activity	Peak	Off-Peak
Email	High	High
Email with attachment	High (HD attachments minimal)	High
Social Media	Moderate	High
Music (streaming/Downloading)	Moderate	High
Video Clip (streaming/Downloading)	Moderate	High
Gaming	Low	High
Movie Streaming (Netflix, YouTube etc.)	Low	High
HD Movie Streaming (Netflix, Hulu etc.)	Low	High
TV Show and Series	Low	High

*LOW placement means it can be done on occasion during these times however continued access during peak times triggers the Fair Usage Policy and as such Liquid Telecom’s recommendation is to restrict this mostly to off-peak times.

 

Excessive Usage:

The table shows examples of use that may result in excessive usage, and it is not limited to:

Activity	Usage Behavior	How to minimize this type of usage
Downloading large files or large quantity of files.	Downloading files like MP3 music files, movies, games, and software using software like Bit Torrent.	Customers are encouraged to refrain from using automated download programs and limit peer to peer file downloading.
Online Gaming	Online gaming average data transfer +/- 100MB per hour.	Limit usage of data transfer when playing games
Social media sharing of content and streaming of news.	Social media applications used for sharing files like music, photos, video cause large data transfer: e.g. WhatsApp, Facebook etc.	Beware of background downloading programs. Always be aware of what your computer is running.
Fraud	Unprotected computers can be compromised or hijacked and used to transmit data with the owner not knowing.	Secure your computer and be sure your network is also secured. Engage our Liquid Telecom team for expert advice.
Browser use	Automated copying of website content can result in high usage levels.	Manually select the content that needs to be copied.
Streaming video	Watching movies and series continuously.	Depending on the package subscribed, a Customer is advised that on average a movie in HD is 3-5GB and SD 1.5GB which will run for 1Hr 30Mins and has impact on data consumption.

 

Improper usage

Customers shall not engage in any activity that compromises or threatens Liquid Telecom’s ability to provide broadband services in a reasonable and efficient manner to all other Customers.

Broadband services may be used only for lawful purposes and the transmission, distribution, or storage of any material in violation of any applicable law or regulation is prohibited. This includes, without limitation material protected by copyright, trademark, trade secret or intellectual property right used without proper authorization and material that contravenes laws of Uganda including but not limited to content regulation, hate speech, defamation and the making of threats, breach of privacy, unsolicited communications.

 

Violations of system or network security is prohibited and in addition to an action for improper usage in terms of this Policy, it may result into criminal and or civil liability. Liquid Telecom shall investigate incidents involving such violations and may involve or cooperate with law enforcement agencies if a criminal violation is suspected.

Examples of security violations include but are not limited to the following:

• Unauthorized access or use of data, systems, or networks, including any attempt to probe, scan, or test vulnerability of a system or network or to breach security or authentication measures without authorization of the owner.
• Unauthorized monitoring of data or traffic on any network or system without express authorization of the owner.
• Interference with service to any Customer, host or network including, without limitation, mail bombing (spam), deliberate attempts to overload a system and broadcast attacks.
• Forging of any TCP/IP packet header or any part of the header information in an email or a newsgroup posting.
• Knowingly distribute computer viruses or other malicious programs.
• The infringement of other’s intellectual property rights or breaching of any laws or infringement of any third-party rights, including without limitation, copyright.

Download limitations and Technical measures to Prevent Abuse of Broadband Service

Liquid Telecom reserves the right to implement technical mechanisms which limit or prevent usage patterns in violation of this Policy. Liquid Telecom further reserves the right to take action and measures necessary to protect the integrity of the system, including but not limited to, system monitoring as well as protocol monitoring and shutting down of ports affected by viruses, worms, or other malicious code.

Customers who have over usage on the same broadband/fibre package during peak periods, such that they trigger the Policy mechanism, will have their data usage prioritized below other Customers and/or speed reduced. If Liquid Telecom Broadband/ Fibre package is used in a manner that could interfere with other Customers' service, affect Liquid Telecom’s ability to allocate network capacity among Customers, or degrade service quality for other Customers, Liquid Telecom may recommend that the Customer switches to a more appropriate broadband/ fibre package plan, restrict data session, suspend or terminate the service.

Legal Rights

No clause in the Policy shall be construed to limit Liquid Telecom’s rights or remedies in actioning any foregoing activities such as, without limitation: investigating suspected violations of this FUP, taking action to recover costs and expenses of identifying offenders. Liquid Telecom reserves all available rights and remedies with respect to such activities at Law or in equity. Any breach of this Policy resulting into criminal or civil liability shall be prosecuted in accordance with the Laws of Uganda.

This FUP may be clarified or modified periodically and Liquid Telecom reserves the right to modify this Policy at any time, which changes shall become effective as soon as they are posted to the Liquid Telecom website.

This Policy forms part of the Customer’s agreement with Liquid Telecom regarding the Broadband Services Liquid Telecom provides in the market and constitutes part of the Terms and Conditions of Service. In case of any conflict between this Policy and the Service Terms and Conditions, this Policy shall take precedence over such Terms and Conditions.