cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

Advertised speeds ?

Bob_Milton
Grafter
Posts: 688
Registered: ‎31-07-2007

Advertised speeds ?

Bosses at six of the UK's top net providers are being asked to explain why consumers do not get the broadband speeds firms advertise.
The above is a quotation from the BBC's newspage. Have a look at the rest of the article.    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7037278.stm
What is likely to be PlusNet's response to this request? I wonder what percentage of Plusnet's customers get a speed which averages about 2Mbps?
4 REPLIES 4
chillypenguin
Grafter
Posts: 4,729
Registered: ‎04-04-2007

Re: Advertised speeds ?

Moderators Note
As pointed out this is not really a referral issues, so I have moved it to Everything Internet.
Jonathan
aka Chilly
James
Grafter
Posts: 21,036
Thanks: 5
Registered: ‎04-04-2007

Re: Advertised speeds ?

Hi Bob,
We advertise speeds as "upto 8Mbps" so suggesting that speeds could be anything from 512Kbps to 8Mbps because, as you will know, broadband over copper wiring is heavily dependant on the distance which the data has to travel for various signal loss reasons.
We are extra careful to ensure that we provide as much information as we possibly can regarding how the Max product works and what speeds can be expected when using our services.  I'd say that we provide more information regarding this than any other ISP in this country.
It will be interesting to see if any action is taken after this article.  But it's not like anyone got their wrists slapped for advertising and unlimited product which isn't unlimited. Bit of a pet hate that one.
Peter_Vaughan
Grafter
Posts: 14,469
Registered: ‎30-07-2007

Re: Advertised speeds ?

I think the point of the article / investigation is to make more realistic estimates of the speed that the customer will get rather than the vague 128Kbs -> 8Mbs (upto!) figure. The fact that you can't actually get 8Mbs speeds is also something that should be reconsidered, even though this is what BT say.
I also think BT's original estimates of how may people will get the higher speeds was somewhat flawed, and BTs methods of IP profile changes also adds to the frustration.
While the BT database can be wrong, quoting the figures it gives when a customer signs up would be far better than raising the expectation by quoting the 8Mbs figure (7Mbs actually!) when in reality very few will get those speeds .
It was all well and good quoting the 8Mbs figures when the Max products were originally marketed but now reality has set in ad people should be told more realistic figures. Even if they may not be 100% accurate, they will be much closer to the actual speeds than the vague (and now wrong) up to 8Mbs.
James
Grafter
Posts: 21,036
Thanks: 5
Registered: ‎04-04-2007

Re: Advertised speeds ?

Hi Peter,
Fully agree with what you're saying.
Yesterday I was looking into the signup journey and the possibility that there are a large number of people that migrate into us that are not selecting the "I have broadband with another supplier" option and instead go for the "Free setup" option.  This from my perspective would cause a number of people to not complete their signups because the order will initially be rejected.
We've made a decision to order the options, so that migrating in is at the top.  We could also look at having the previous page asking whether or not the customer is migrating in from another supplier, which would be even more helpful.  I've also started talking about the improvements into the signup jourmey (I think this is Signup Phase 3) and the implementation of a line checker, giving us a more intuitive guide as to whether or not the customer has an active broadband service on the line.  What I'd like to think that we would also be possible would be to implement a guide as to what speeds that we *expect* the customer to be able to receive, also with a disclaimer that this is an estimation, etc.