Broadband ISP Plusnet UK Sweeps the 2022 Expert Reviews Awards
Consumer site Expert Reviews has posted the winners of their annual ‘Best Broadband Awards 2022‘ event, which surveyed consumers in an effort to identify the top UK Internet Service Providers (ISP) across a range of different categories. The overall winner this year was Plusnet.
The results stemmed from an online and YouGov commissioned survey of 2,033 UK adults (of which 1,940 had a broadband provider). The small sample meant that only the largest ISPs could be compared, including BT, EE, Plusnet, Sky Broadband, TalkTalk, Virgin Media (VMO2) and Vodafone.
Plusnet scooped wins for three of the five categories, while BT and Virgin Media won the remaining two. Plusnet was the clear winner where customer service was concerned, with 73% of their customers being highly or quite satisfied with customer service. It also came out on top for value for money, with 71% happy with what they were paying. Coupled with a huge 73% of respondents saying they were highly likely (15%) or quite likely (58%) to recommend the service to others, Plusnet earned itself the Overall Winner award.
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In terms of customers who would recommend the other ISPs, some 68% said they’d recommend Vodafone, followed by Sky on 63%, BT on 61%, TalkTalk on 57%, Virgin Media on 55% and EE at the bottom with 54%. However, we note that Vodafone’s position was hobbled by concerns elsewhere, such as over customer service and a high level of Ofcom complaints.
Expert Reviews Award Winners for 2022
Overall Winner: Plusnet
Highly commended: Sky BroadbandBest Customer Service: Plusnet
Highly commended: EEMost Reliable: BT
Highly commended: Sky BroadbandBest Value: Plusnet
Highly commended: VodafoneBest Speed: Virgin Media
Highly commended: BT
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook and Linkedin.
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While Plusnet was not a bad provider a few years ago I’d struggle to give it best provider while its still the only major provider to not offer FTTP.
Nice thats its not difficult to find something good to say for most providers:
– BT have excellent social tariffs
– Vodafone have low prices
– Sky are actually doing IPV6 (unlike the others…)
– TalkTalk have good prices and the best availability (Voda & TT are the main Cityfibre providers but Voda suffers from its spotty Openreach FTTP availability)
– Virgin Media have widespread fast speeds
Compared to a few years ago when the most you could say is that most are ok and Virgin Media is very fast.
I feel like Plusnet is getting left behind to be honest, most providers have improved while plusnet seem to take ages to improve. I know they are struggling with FTTP due to their ordering systems but Openreach started properly deploying it back in mid 2018, plusnet have had a while to get this fixed.
Excellent points made and I couldn’t agree more. Lack of IPv6 is unforgivable for any modern ISP now.
@Ben IPV6 is a good thing for an ISP to offer though I wouldnt count it heavily against them if they didn’t have it. Though my view will probably change.
@Anon while I don’t think Plusnet paid for this, I wouldn’t be suprised if the survey accidently favoured plusnet. For example if you only interviewed old people who are very light internet users, they’ll be happy with plusnet and will likely not care about FTTP.
I disagree with the way these awards done, seemingly by just the survey and not judges who have the survey for information on real world experience.
Totally agree , I’ve been with Plusnet for around 15 years, but lack of FTTP and an archaic billing system , I am jumping ship and going FTTP with Trooli , doing away with a house phone (which hardly gets used and I’m paying line rental for that ) each family member gets 5000 mins uk landline and mobiles on our call plan anyway and for £1.25 more than I am paying Plusnet, I am getting 300 download and 100 upload speeds compared with 32 download and 3 upload!! agree, they were good a few years ago, but I expect , although they are already owned by BT, they will be swallowed up soon anyway
“if you only interviewed old people who are very light internet users”
I love this stereotyping. many “old people” are heavy internet users and FTTP was/is a god-send for them.
As for Plusnet, well, I am surprised.
I’m aware that some old people are heavy Internet users, that’s why I specified ones who use the Internet lightly.
I’d like to see the facts to support this theoretical demographic but I expect something like:
Very light 50GB users, dominated by pensioners.
Light 250GB users, the majority from all age groups.
Heavy 1TB users, young and middle age working families.
Extreme 2TB+ users, a handful of users across all age groups.
I don’t think it’s unfair to generalise that younger probably means families with greater usage while older probably means 2 adults or less. In this PC world we now find ourselves in then that’s probably a generalisation that is not right to make though!
Is this a joke? PlusNet “best customer service”?
Is it April 1st again 🙂
Hope they are good, I’ve just setup a switch from TalkTalk!
Hi Adam
How have you got on with TalkTalk since joining them please?
How on earth did they manage that.
Their motto used to be . We’ll do you proud. Now it’s that’ll do.
It didn’t for me, constant billing mistakes, flaky service so in the end I jumped ship
Strange seeing negative comments about Plus net. I’ve been with them for most of the last 2 decades and they’ve been very good for the most part. Customer service is and has always been spot on for me. The FTTP missing is the only valid issue I have with them right now. I have the option to upgrade, but I’m waiting on plusnet to offer the service. Supposedly it will be launched this year and I’m willing to wait and give them a chance. Hopefully it won’t be much longer.
It’s not that Plusnet are bad, it’s that they offer nothing above what the other players in the budget broadband field have and in some cases actually offer less (no FTTP, no IPv6).
To win an award seems disingenuous.
Ipv6 ..realistically what is it…less that 1 or 0.1% of users that care or want…so irrelevant …
Billing system broke for 15 years ..give over…are you a customer? Erm…I think not if you are then great pop your details over I will fix it in 24hours…if not .shush..you are just chatting…
Customer service..yes they are the best…as with all providers sometimes you get a less that great one and maybe it’s outsource but at the same time you get it sorted but if not then again pass the details of you’re a customer..
I see all these comments or the negative comments everyone’s fast to slate anyone if it was BT or we you would still moan about useless ipv6 for the majority who don’t actually need want or care less about it…
FTTP is here this year where available
Beggars belief some people want blood out of a stone ..for a 5er a week lol.. jeez..
So much negativity I cannot believe it…most will be playing on the fancy routers with zero life or wife bless ..
Nice to see some normal comments from real people and real customers…refreshing… As for those who are not customers commenting it’s like having financial advice from a baker… You just wouldn’t listen would you..
are you the big lad on the adverts…?
Don’t drink and type.
stuck up your own butt mate. Obviously an employer for plusnet. why would anyone wanna deal with someone like you.
give over…
When Plusnet win best anything, you know that the awards are a joke.
I have been with them a couple of times for broadband and had no problems, although as others have stated their lack of FTTP means they are becoming isolated going forward. I use Plusnet for mobile and again no issues.
Plusnet, a company that charges for an all inclusive call allowance but has a £75 per month cap on chargeable calls, with no option whatsoever to exclude all chargeable calls, that loophole then permits premium rate calls by those with access to openreach cabinets, or outright fraud by the Plusnet ‘billing’ system
Plusnet, a company that, despite broadband dropping out every few mins, and an openreach tech replacing an NTE5, proceeds to charge £140 for ‘no fault found’
That anyone could ever put them top of this list is staggering, they are utter rubbish.
@Martin E I couldn’t agree more. The whole thing’s rigged when dross like this rises to the top.
@Martin E
That…
a) seems like a gripe against Openreach not the ISP
b) is something that must have happened quite some time ago. You need to move on with your life.