The Ofcom Consumer Panel has just called for action to be taken against ISPs who advertise the maximum theoretical speed available on an ADSL line, knowing full well that the majority of their customers will never come close to achieving the full ‘up to’ speed.
Colette Bowe, chairman of the Ofcom Consumer Panel and sometime memo-leaker called for Ofcom to draw up a robust code of conduct for ISPs that would force providers to be more honest with their customers during the sign up process: “This code would establish agreed processes to give the customer the best information during and after the sales process, and to give them flexibility to move freely to different packages that reflect the actual speeds with which their ISPs are able to provide them.”
As everyone has come to realise, often the hard way, ADSL speeds are mostly affected by the distance between the exchange and the customer’s house, the efficiency and performance of the router and the general processing power of the computer itself. The Advertising Standards Agency has repeatedly hauled ISPs over the coals in the past for omitting details in ad campaigns which could have potentially misled customers - Sky and Virgin both recently got a ticking off over a series of print-based ads and Tiscali did a naughty with a radio ad in the summer.
“This information would help consumers understand the technical issues affecting their broadband speeds, and over which they have control. It would also provide quality of service information to assist in their decision over which ISP to opt for,” continued Bowe.
In a nutshell, the OCP chairman has pretty much described the whole Broadband Finder ethos; customers can make use of our Line Speed Check and Speed Test tools to get a rough estimate of what broadband speed they can expect based on distance between the nearest exchange and any given postcode, so they know what to expect.
We welcome the comments by Colette Bowe and hope that Ofcom and providers take note – the first ISP to ditch ‘up to’ and replace it with ‘at least’ is sure to do well in earning consumers trust.
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