Latency between upload and download

Is there a reason my upload latency is almost twice my download latency? Do the recent changes in latency happen to be a part of the new gaming option in some markets, because it happened about the same time? Is my routing changed to accommodate other markets to sell this gamer option? Didn't used to be like this, if not, what changed? And, is there a plan to fix it? Also, is there a service that I can sign up to that gives me updates on outages or issues so I don't have to call? I have few more questions if someone would be so kind as to answer these first.