Bad ping times on virgin ADSL

I'm getting pings of 200+ on virgin 512k ADSL.
I mainly notice it when trying to play online games but it happens at
every server i try and ping too.
Sometimes it will drop back down to 30-40 for a minute or two then
just get right back up to 200.

I know virgin have had a few problems but they said they've ben sorted
now but my pings were fine a few weeks ago i just couldnt open up any
websites o_O.

I tried emailing them just still waiting for a reply.

Any good advice for lowering my ping then? Or is it a lost cause?

I'm using a d-link dsl-504 if that is any help....

thx