I have welcomed a new interactive service that helps consumers to find out how well they are being served by their telecoms provider. Consumers can find out how well they are served by major telecoms companies thanks to a new interactive tool launched by Ofcom.
The online tool presents findings from Ofcom’s first ‘Comparing Service Quality’ report in a simple, visual format. The comprehensive report and accompanying checker allows phone and broadband customers to compare how different companies rate for answering customer calls, handling complaints, and reliability of their services.The data draws on a combination of consumer research and complaints figures, as well as statistics obtained directly from telecoms companies that have never been published before.
The report sets out consumers’ overall satisfaction with their providers, which remains high - overall, 92% of mobile customers, 89% of landline telephone customers and 87% of broadband customers were satisfied with their service. However, it also looks at levels of complaints by company and satisfaction with how complaints were handled – just over half those who complained to their mobile or broadband company were satisfied with complaint handling.
Ofcom said:
‘We want this information to shine a light on how different companies perform, and we are challenging the industry to up its game on customer service. We will be monitoring performance closely to ensure industry service standards are raised.
‘Ofcom wants to help bring about a service revolution in the telecoms sector, where consistency and excellence become the norm, and customers always come first. We will report on telecoms quality of service annually and will use new powers in the Digital Economy Bill to gather more information to help consumers make better choices.’
This is a great new way for people to find out which companies are providing the best service. It will help to empower people to make the best choice when choosing a telecoms company and will provide a good incentive for those companies to become better and more competitive – meaning better outcomes for paying customers. I would urge people to check it out.
The report and the online checker can be found here: https://www.ofcom.org.uk/about-ofcom/latest/features-and-news/service-quality-telecoms-providers
Ofcom has also published its annual report on UK Home Broadband Performance, which compares the performance of 19 popular broadband packages, from seven internet providers. The findings show that while average UK broadband download speeds have increased by 25% over the last year (up 7.3Mbit/s to 36.2 Mbit/s), the speeds offered by providers are not consistent throughout the day, and can fall significantly during busy periods due to people going online at the same time.