Kingston Communications UK ( Karoo ), a provider of telecommunications services to the Hull and the East Riding region of Yorkshire, has called for greater transparency of broadband ISP speeds. The provider claims to have done its part by launching a visual ‘Speed Map’ for every postcode within its coverage, which was created by measuring the performance of every active Karoo home broadband connection.

Kingston correctly believes that speed is still a key issue because people increasingly use the internet for bandwidth-hungry applications such as streaming and downloading video. Broadband speeds fluctuate across networks – getting slower the further away from the telephone exchange – but it is also difficult for broadband users to know what speeds they can expect as providers only give out the maximum ‘up to’ speeds.

Furthermore, Kingston notes that previously published speed maps have traditionally estimated speeds based on line lengths or a very small number of connection speeds within a given geographical area - making them highly inaccurate.


The operator states that its map is created by taking readings every 15 minutes from every active Karoo broadband connection and calculating the average speed for each postcode. KC claims customers benefit from the one of the country’s best performing fixed line networks - 83% of those on an ADSL2+ connection in the area receive average speeds of 6Mbps or more and almost 100% receive minimum speeds of 2Mbps.

However the cynical might point out that having an ability to check the speed of connections in an area where you can only get one primary service (Karoo) is perhaps not quite as beneficial as they might hope.