New Study Claims 43 Million UK Adults are “blighted” by Unreliable Broadband

The latest uSwitch.com survey of 2,004 “nationally representative UK adults” has claimed that over 43 million home broadband users (83%) suffer from poor reliability. But despite more reliable “superfast broadband” (24Mbps+) being available to 93% of homes, just 57% of Brits believe they can access it.

Apparently the biggest broadband bugbear(s) for those who claim to suffer from poor reliability is slow loading web pages (71%), which is followed by internet disconnections (67%), buffering while trying to watch online videos / listening to music (63%) and crashing (54%). NOTE: The inclusion of “crashing” in the same option list as “disconnection” doesn’t make a lot of sense when talking about the broadband connection itself (i.e. uSwitch should have given more context in their questioning to help define the difference).

At this point we should say that the survey appears keen to equate all of these issues to the home broadband connection itself, although external issues with poor WiFi, bad software or hardware and other problems can also cause some of those same bugbears. In that sense simply swapping to a faster connection won’t always fix the issue. On top of that even so-called “superfast” lines can also cause similar problems.

Andrew Glover, Chair of the UK ISPA Council, said:

“uSwitch correctly highlights that superfast broadband is now available to the vast majority of users (93%) but their figures on customer satisfaction are misleading and based on a simplistic survey. More robust data from the industry regulator Ofcom clearly demonstrates that 86% of UK broadband users are happy with the reliability of their current service.

Our members are actively investing billions in their networks and provide help and support to their customers if they experience problems with their connection but it is worth noting that buffering and dropped connection can be caused by issues with in-home devices or indeed the online content provider.”

But of most interest is the finding concerning awareness, which is something we’ve touched on before. At present just under half of homes still connect via the slower and less reliable ADSL broadband lines of yesterday, although more reliable fixed line “superfast broadband” (24Mbps+) connections are currently estimated to cover over 93% of UK premises.

However the survey found that only 57% of users believe they can access superfast speeds in their area and 30% don’t know if they can access such services at all, which suggests that the take-up of faster connectivity may soon hit a big hurdle because many people simply won’t realise that it’s available. The study also found that 19% of broadband users would switch ISP for faster speeds and 38% would switch for a cheaper deal.

Ewan Taylor-Gibson of uSwitch.com said:

“While not a magic bullet, superfast broadband – sometimes referred to as fibre or by a branded name – can significantly reduce speed and reliability issues. As it stands though, only 57% of consumers believe they can access superfast services in their area when in reality, 90% of premises should be able to access these speeds.

Quite simply, most consumers aren’t bothered by the technical definitions of their broadband connection, they just want – and deserve – a reliable service that delivers value. However, consumer speed frustrations coupled with a lack of awareness around superfast availability shows more needs to be done to communicate what’s available to individual properties in a meaningful way.

Since customers can’t ‘try superfast before they buy’, the next best solution is for the industry to improve transparency around speeds, showing what’s available from providers side-by-side, in a personalised way. Consumers can currently do a postcode search to see if superfast is available to their property but actual speeds for the property need to be put in context. Industry needs to find ways to allow quick and easy comparison of the current and potential speeds available to the property, by provider, in order to evaluate and select the service that offers best value.”

Most ISPs will not automatically upgrade customers to a faster service, which is largely because such packages are more expensive, although there’s definitely scope for ISPs to promote those faster services to their existing customers in a much clearer way (e.g. show them their current speed and then their personal estimate for speeds under the faster package, alongside maybe a special upgrade offer).

However uSwitch is perhaps being unrealistic if they think that ISPs themselves will do anything to promote rival services (Virgin Media might do quite well out of that). Giving people a personal estimate across different network platforms would be technically very difficult, not to mention a few issues with the use of personal data.

We should point out that awareness is only one of the hindrances to the take-up of faster connectivity. The higher prices for related “fibre” services, as well as customers being locked into long contracts with their existing ISP (they can’t upgrade immediately) and a lack of interest in the new service (if you have a decent ADSL2+ speed then you might feel less inclined to upgrade) can also be a problem.

Confusion over terminology may be another problem area. Some 94% of respondents said they understood that “fibre” is “faster than standard” broadband but 26% admit they don’t know what types of service will deliver superfast speeds to their home.

This is partly why it’s still important to promote service speeds because simply promoting something as “fibre” often isn’t good enough, particularly with the on-going confusion over “fibre” FTTC and “full fibre” FTTP/H that we hope the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) will soon resolve.