Broadband News

Brits wasting millions on the wrong broadband packages

Friday, 03 September 2010

By Garnet Roach garnet@consumerchoices.co.uk

Broadband users could be wasting as much as £700million a year on faster packages that they simply do not need, O2 broadband (www.O2.co.uk) has revealed.

The average customer pays for an up to 20Mb broadband package - though most people only really need speeds of up to 8Mb.

Just 18% of people used their broadband connection for bandwidth-hungry streaming services such as the BBC iPlayer or listening to online radio, revealed O2, while 5% downloaded music and only 3% downloaded films.

Most people’s online activities needed relatively low bandwidth:

• 77% people use broadband for emailing
• 74% for surfing the web
• 51% for paying bills and online banking
• 35% for social networking.

Felix Geyr, Head of O2 Home and Broadband, says: “62% of broadband consumers in our survey would prefer their ISP to provide packages based around their specific needs. Therefore, our industry needs to tailor its services to people’s needs, help consumers understand exactly what they should be buying and avoid marketing based solely on speed.

“It would be much more transparent if we took the same ‘a la carte’ approach offered to customers buying digital TV packages, where people can opt in to obtain more expensive services like film and sport.”