Fraudband Britain - Ofcom wants to hear from YOU
You told us how unhappy you are with the speed of your broadband. Today, Ofcom has cracked the whipped. Broadband firms face formal action if they fail to get their act together.
Ben Wallis from Ofcom's Consumer Panel has been looking at your comments and has written this for the iPM blog. Please let him know what you think. ..
"The Ofcom Consumer Panel, the independent body that advises Ofcom, has asked Ofcom to take a lead in tackling consumer concerns about advertised broadband connection speeds.
Surveys by Which? and Computer Active magazine in the summer showed that most people get their broadband at far slower speeds than the âup to 8MBâ speeds that figure so prominently in the advertising. This gap will only grow wider with the arrival soon of ADSL2+ and more packages of âup to 24MBâ and beyond.
In October we wrote to the chief executives of the UKâs six largest Internet Service Providers (ISPs) (PDF). We made suggestions about how they could give their customers clearer information to understand the factors that influence the speed of their broadband connection, and more flexibility if the service doesnât live up to their expectations.
After hearing from the ISPs, we wrote to Ofcom asking the regulator to lead discussions with the industry. We asked them to produce an enforceable code of practice to give customers the best information during and after the sales process. We also want customers to have the flexibility to move freely to different packages that reflect the actual speeds with which their ISPs are able to provide them.
Weâve also asked the Advertising Standards Authority to tighten up the advertising of broadband speeds so that, instead of being found in the small print, much greater prominence is given to the range of factors that affect the speeds you can get. Ofcom responded (PDF) immediately to the Consumer Panel, welcoming the lead we've taken and outlining the ways in which it plans to tackle the issues we raised.
We would love to hear your views.
Ben Wallis, Policy Executive, Ofcom Consumer Panel
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Comments
I have an 'up to 8mbps' connection with Madasafish and have complained that I am only receiving 2.3mbps at its highest and goes down to 1.6mbps on peak times, I was told it should accommodate a stable speed of 4.5mbps in my original correspondence with them.
My complaint is that all my neighbours are getting 4/5.5mb with the same types of property, all built as a small development at the same time, and all the same distance from the exchange. My ISP says it's BT's dictation as to line speed on my connection, BT say I will have to discuss it with BT Wholesale, BT Wholesale say they will only discuss it with my ISP.
So I am left paying £23.12 a month for effectively a sub-standard service in terms of speed which nobody will take responsibility for and I cannot get out of the contract unitl July 2008.
Thanks for your attention any helpful suggestions would be appreciated.
Terry Concannon.
Mmm, slower than you think! m - milli, M - Mega. So is that 2.3 milli bits per second :)
I'm not belittling your problem, I have seen so called broadband connections testing at less than 200 Kbps. Dodgy ADLS filters can cause problems too so it's worth checking them out before you go to OFCOM.
Made me smile though.
I registered with Tiscali 2l/2yrs. ago and am supposed to receive 2.3mbps@ £14.99 month. Over the years the speed has steadily got slower and in fact I frequently cannot get Broadband at all, despite waiting 10 or more minutes then logging off and on again. Hopeless, and very frustrating.
I pay for an 8Mbit connection with BT broadband, supposedly an unlimmited account. I have never received speeds above 2Mbitps, and frequently all I receive is 800kbps. This is definitely implemented at the exchange, and has nothing to do with line faults, as it varies with the time of day.
Recently BT have gone a stage further and are now disconnecting my connection randomly for random periods of time ... when I asked for my MAC so I could change provider they told me that I am going to have to pay them a sum of money to LEAVE them !!
This is extortion, plain and simple. Why after 20 years are we still having to have this company run our internet infrastructure. They are damaging our economy, providing a complete lack of investment in fibre optics and even Estonia is light years ahead of us. Why is this company allowed to continue in business, surely there is national interest at stake here ?
I am paying for a 2Mb line.
This has been getting progressively worse over the last year, NOW my ISP Eclipse.co.uk are upgrading some parts !.
BUT in testing the line with http://speedtester.bt.com it states that my line is only connected at 1Mb !.
No real need for anymore testing but have a go at ISP who knows this !, but doesnt inform customers.
They are quite willing to mislead customers into thinking they will get faster speeds !.
The other concern is that when we originally got ADSL some 3 yrs ago the speed could go up to 6mb at times BUT much faster than 2Mb, so now with more customers I think BT have downgraded as well as the ISP's.
BUT remember to leave DSL router always ON for at least 3 days to sync line.
I am paying for a 2Mb line.
This has been getting progressively worse over the last year, NOW my ISP Eclipse.co.uk are upgrading some parts !.
BUT in testing the line with http://speedtester.bt.com it states that my line is only connected at 1Mb !.
No real need for anymore testing but have a go at ISP who knows this !, but doesnt inform customers.
They are quite willing to mislead customers into thinking they will get faster speeds !.
The other concern is that when we originally got ADSL some 3 yrs ago the speed could go up to 6mb at times BUT much faster than 2Mb, so now with more customers I think BT have downgraded as well as the ISP's.
BUT remember to leave DSL router always ON for at least 3 days to sync line.
I am with supanet, paying for an up to 8Mb service, I queried my connection speed with them on several occassions, to be told I should get up to 4.5Mbps, after approx 3 weeks and numerous phone calls later, I was told that my poor connection speed 312kbps was due to the line type and the local exchange which could manage a max of 0.5Mbps.
The house I live was built only 4 years ago, I find it hard to believe that it is the line and I am only 1 mile from the exchange. My conclusion is that it must be the exchange. Is there anything I can do???
Regards
Andrew