With ISPs so relentlessly eager to move from flat rate to usage-based billing, you would think that they would have made sure they had the technical skills to do so first. Again and again however we've noted how U.S. and Canadian ISPs that implement usage meters simply aren't tracking and billing for usage accurately. In the States AT&T has stumbled through metered billing implementation, as customers continue to note AT&T's meters don't match customer router totals.

In Canada, customers of Canadian cable company Cogeco consistently complain of accuracy issues that appear to have persisted for more than a year, while Cogeco has busily started handing out bills for thousands of dollars in overages. Users are forced to install third party router firmware if they want an accurate picture of their usage, but even with evidence of problems ISPs aren't heeding customer complaints.

Bell customers in our forums continue to complain about meter accuracy, and in one instance a nuclear engineer struggles with overage billing confusion -- making you wonder how normal users fare. Rogers users in our forums also continue to complain about meter accuracy, noticing that some months the meters just stop working entirely:Says another user:I harp on this a lot but it bears repeating: not only are these limits unnecessary and anti-competitive, nobody, anywhere, at any level of U.S. or Canadian government is working to ensure that ISPs are metering usage accurately. ISPs for years insisted that they should be able to bill broadband like a utility, yet fought tooth and nail when it came to having their meters regulated like a utility. While an entirely new system of unreliable usage-based billing spreads across North America generating millions in new revenue, no regulator, anywhere, has deemed double-checking meter accuracy worthy of their time.