I've had a similiar horror story with Eircom, one of Ireland's main providers. We were paying for 3mb/s at €40/month but only receiving around 0.4mb/s. I gave customer service a ring and they said they could downgrade the line to 1mb/s which would improve the actual signal but we'd still have to pay for the 3mb/s. I really wish it was nationalized like electricity but I don't think our government is technically competent yet.