Broadband is getting faster in the UK but many customers
are not reaching anything near the speeds that service providers
are advertising.
According to research from
thinkbroadband.com, the average UK broadband
download speed is now 2Mbps - up from the 512Kbps available three
years ago.
The figures are based on over three million broadband speed
tests carried out by the website's users.
Despite the overall improvement, the website said many people
sold broadband services that can “operate up to 8mbps” are still
getting nowhere near that figure.
For many customers, the maximum speed they can get is dependant
on the quality of their phone line and the distance they are from
the phone exchange.
However, said thinkbroadband.com, some broadband providers were
deliberately keeping people on lower fixed connections to save on
costs, including services sold at “up to 8mbps”.
The minimum broadband speed offered by BT is 8mbps, but like
many other providers the company does not guarantee that users will
get anything near this connection rate.
The rates customers get is also dependant on the “contention
rate” in the exchanges, where different users basically share the
same connection in the exchange.
Some providers have higher contention rates than others, meaning
if a small number of users sharing the connection are downloading
high bandwidth content like streamed video or a large number of
users are online, the other users get a lower connection rate.
BT has promised to increase its basic broadband connection rate
to over 20mbps for some users from this year, and this target will
eventually apply to all users nationally.
There have been calls for BT and other providers to invest in
fibre connections to the home, which would replace traditional
copper lines.
Such a move would deliver user connection speeds of above
50mbps, like in countries including Japan and South Korea.
However, comms regulator Ofcom told telecom managers at the
recently held Communications Management Association
conference that it would not support the call for fibre until it
saw how BT and other providers scaled up their ADSL broadband
speeds.
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