Sounds quite horrid.
Is the same happening to other services or are we singled out? How about your french mates on other ISPs - Likewise or different?
@ rototo: Thanks for the info. Let me know what you find with your friends on other ISPs in France.
Thanks for confirming my fear. If this is persistent I'll see if we could route the traffic through other ISPs in order to maximize speed. My thoughts are that Orange knows where the traffic is coming straight from right now. Let me know if it takes a turn for the better.
Can you run it through IDM with your current ISP? Maybe you could get 8 x 20 KB/sec = 160 KB/sec total.