Quarter of broadband customers 'unhappy'

A quarter of broadband customers are unhappy with the service they are receiving, with the "free" broadband providers Orange and Carphone Warehouse's TalkTalk attracting the most criticism, according to a new survey from uSwitch.

The decline in service standards comes despite companies such as Carphone Warehouse and Virgin Media spending millions of pounds improving their customer-service functions. It is the first time that dissatisfaction with customer service among broadband users has hit 25 per cent, a 3 per cent rise since the price comparison firm last surveyed customers in October.

Chris Frost, a product manager at uSwitch, said that Orange's customer satisfaction levels have fallen 18 per cent since it launched "free" broadband 14 months ago, while TalkTalk has yet to reap the benefits of its £15m investment in improving its customer-service functions. "The performance of both companies suggests that "free" does not necessarily ensure happiness, as the customers paying for their broadband appear to be happier than the ones who are not," Mr Frost said.

USwitch surveyed 9,000 home-phone customers and 11,000 broadband users and found that 35 per cent of Orange users - equating to about 400,000 customers - were not satisfied, while 31 per cent of TalkTalk's broadband users were unhappy.

"This time last year, free broadband was a novelty. Now it has become a life essential, so when things go wrong, they usually go badly wrong," Mr Frost said, adding that connection problems and service interruptions occur far too frequently. "Major players, including TalkTalk and BT, vowed they would reach the top of the customer-service league this year. Is it a case of all TalkTalk, no action?" Mr Frost asked.

Plusnet, a unit of BT, came out top of the survey with 78 per cent satisfied. BT came first for technical support, but was considered worst value for money. At Virgin Media and Sky, 76 per cent of customers were happy.