Growing Consumer Dissatisfaction With UK ISPs
Point Topic’s latest BroadBand User Consumer Survey has highlighted growing dissatisfaction amongst UK consumers with the internet service they receive from their ISPs.
“From 92% of respondents saying they were ‘very’ or ‘fairly’ satisfied in February 2006 with the service they receive overall, it has dropped to 77% in December 2006.”
Point Topic questioned users in a number of different categories of user satisfaction, including speed of service, billing clarity and value for money.
It pointed out that of particular note was the change in users who reported being ‘very’ or ‘fairly’ dissatisfied with the ‘after sales support’ which went from 7% in Feb 2006 to 18.3% in Dec 2006.
Dr Mueller added: “It suggests that many ISPs are focusing on the rush to gain market share in a rapidly consolidating market at the expense of customer service. In the long-run they may pay dearly for this neglect.”
The broadband research company said that it is likely that churn will be a major factor in the consumer broadband market in 2007.
At the end of February, the Office of National Statistics released a report which showed that eight out of ten internet connections are now via broadband (see UK Broadband Connections Increase).
Recent research from ABI Research said that broadband will reach almost half a billion subscribers globally by 2011 (see Global Broadband Subscribers To Increase).