Ofcom
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Service quality of telecoms providers revealed

People can find out how well major telecoms providers serve their customers, using an interactive tool launched by Ofcom yesterday.

  • New Ofcom report shows how providers compare on call waiting, complaints handling and reliability
  • Service quality comparison tool is available at www.ofcom.org.uk/servicequality
  • Annual broadband performance report highlights varying speeds

The online tool presents findings from Ofcom’s first ‘Comparing Service Quality’ report – published yesterday – in a simple, visual format.

The comprehensive report and accompanying checker allows phone and broadband customers to compare how different providers 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 providers that have never been published before.

The findings should incentivise providers to improve their service quality and fix recurring problems.

Importantly, they will also help inform consumers who are shopping around for a new provider.

Sharon White, Ofcom Chief Executive, has yesterday launched the Comparing Service Quality report at an event co-hosted by Ofcom and the consumer group Which?. Sharon yesterday said:

“We’re determined to help bring about a service revolution in the telecoms sector, where consistency and excellence becomes the norm, and customers always come first.

“Today we want to shine a light on how different providers perform, and are challenging the industry to up its game on customer service. We’ll be monitoring closely to ensure industry service standards are raised.”

Findings from the report

All the findings cover the calendar year 2016.

Overall satisfaction

Overall, 92% of mobile customers, 89% of landline telephone customers and 87% of broadband customers were satisfied with their service

Virgin Media customers reported the highest levels of overall satisfaction with their broadband service (91%), compared to the sector overall, while BT customers reported the highest levels of overall satisfaction with their landline telephone service (92%). Tesco Mobile customers reported the highest levels of overall satisfaction, compared to the mobile sector as a whole (96%).

Reason to complain

Thirteen percent of broadband customers had a reason to complain to their provider in 2016; this is higher than the proportion of landline telephone customers (5%) and mobile customers (4%).

Virgin Media and TalkTalk had the highest proportion of broadband customers with a reason to complain in 2016 (both 16%). In the mobile market, a higher proportion of Vodafone customers (7%) had reason to complain compared to the market as a whole.

Getting through to customer services

On average, landline telephone and broadband customers had to wait over twice as long to speak to a customer services advisor (2 minutes, 51 seconds) than mobile customers (1 minute). Calls to technical support took two and a half minutes longer on average to answer than sales calls.

Plusnet’s landline and broadband customers waited longest to have their call answered (7 minutes, 27 seconds on average), with more than one in five of its customers (21%) hanging up before getting through.

TalkTalk was quickest at answering its landline and broadband customers’ calls, taking just 47 seconds on average. Together with EE, TalkTalk also had the lowest rate of customers abandoning calls before getting through (4%).

For mobile, O2 customers were kept waiting the longest (2 minutes, 3 seconds on average). The best performer was Tesco Mobile, which took just 30 seconds to answer.

Eight per cent of O2 customers hung up before speaking with an agent, compared with 3% of EE’s mobile customers.

Click here for full press release

 

Channel website: https://www.ofcom.org.uk/

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