This year, we have seen a lot of discussion about broadband services, with speed and availability of broadband being the subject of extensive media coverage. The broadband market is quite mature and the focus for customer service is somewhat shifting from teething problems with new products, to troubleshooting more complicated problems associated with delivering super fast broadband services to the farthest of places.
 |
   |
   |
Customer service is a crucial part of any broadband service, and today we take a step away from the speed race, and look at how well broadband service providers are performing in supporting their customers.
We analysed the customer service ratings submitted by all our users from the beginning of 2009 to mid-December and the results show clearly that some ISPs continue to fare far better than others, as the rankings have not changed drastically since last year.
 |
Winner O2 Broadband (large ISP) AAISP (niche ISP) |
 |
Runner-up: BE Unlimited (large ISP) Zen Internet (niche ISP) |
 |
2nd Runner-up: PlusNet (large ISP) IDNet (niche ISP) |
We have not included mobile broadband providers in these ratings as only some have sufficient results to be included, and we feel that mobile operators should be judged against each other due to the very different service offering they provide. Overall, broadband service providers (including mobile broadband providers) performed better with the average customer service score rising from 46% to 50% and reliability from 54% to 56%.
O2 Broadband retained its top spot within the Large ISP category which covers the top-10 broadband providers by size (based on number of ratings) with BE Unlimited and PlusNet in second and third positions as in 2008.
| ISP | Customer Service | Reliability | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| O2 Broadband | 75% | (18,182) | 68% | (19,515) |
| BE Unlimited | 71% | (6,651) | 69% | (7,359) |
| PlusNet | 66% | (9,723) | 66% | (10,682) |
| Sky Broadband | 51% | (22,772) | 59% | (24,651) |
| Virgin Media | 48% | (55,664) | 57% | (59,105) |
| TalkTalk | 45% | (19,753) | 50% | (21,419) |
| BT Broadband | 42% | (49,295) | 52% | (53,231) |
| Tiscali | 36% | (17,011) | 48% | (18,756) |
| AOL | 36% | (13,189) | 41% | (13,978) |
| Orange | 34% | (16,820) | 43% | (18,109) |
Virgin Media has impressed customers with their customer service score rising from 44 to 48%, but the most notable increase was TalkTalk which increased from 39 to 45% in one year indicating a significant improvement. O2 and BE certainly still dominate the top with a significant lead.
"We launched O2 Home Broadband with a commitment to offer a top quality service for our customers and coming top of the thinkbroadband customer service award for the second year running is a great endorsement of that. The fact that our other ISP, BE Broadband, has come a close second again shows we are committed to our customers across both our businesses. We’re very proud that our customers are pleased with our broadband customer service and we will continue to focus on this in 2010."
Felix Geyr (Head of Home and Broadband), Telefonica O2 UK
Within the Niche ISP category, Andrews & Arnold (commonly known as AAISP) is a new entrant in the top position having achieved sufficient ratings to be included, with Zen Internet and IDNet in second and third position.
| ISP | Customer Service | Reliability | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AAISP | 89% | (1,018) | 82% | (1,043) |
| Zen Internet | 86% | (5,024) | 85% | (5,507) |
| IDNet | 86% | (1,919) | 80% | (2,024) |
| NewNet | 82% | (1,218) | 83% | (1,380) |
| Eclipse | 64% | (3,494) | 65% | (3,894) |
| UK Online | 64% | (1,077) | 63% | (1,198) |
| Entanet | 62% | (3,540) | 62% | (3,786) |
| Madasafish | 62% | (1,630) | 65% | (1,755) |
| F2S | 54% | (2,433) | 58% | (2,978) |
| Nildram | 54% | (2,594) | 58% | (2,873) |
| Karoo | 49% | (921) | 51% | (971) |
| Demon | 43% | (4,066) | 54% | (4,567) |
| Pipex | 34% | (3,895) | 53% | (4,475) |
"We are very pleased to score so highly in the thinkbroadband survey and will strive to improve our score next year. We have founded our business on transparency between ourselves and our users and it is rewarding to see they have rated us so highly"
Adrian Kennard (director), AAISP
Don't forget, you can rate your broadband provider if you're logged in and have defined connections, or you can do so without logging in, by carrying our a speed test first.
staff member)
7 months ago
staff member)
7 months ago
Digg this
Add to del.icio.us
zen and BE very close in numbers it seems, why is BE a large isp and zen a niche isp?