Ofcom is once again patting itself on the back for a job well done on its new broadband Code of Practice. “Which? magazine has hailed the code, which comes into force tomorrow, as a broadband speed victory,” the regulator’s homepage proudly proclaims. Utter cobblers.

Let’s look at the detail. The centrepiece of Ofcom’s Code is that broadband providers must “provide consumers at the point of sale with an accurate estimate of the maximum speed that their line can support.” Can you name me one major ISP that hasn’t already been doing this for months? BT has an online ADSL Line Checker that’s been spitting out this information for years.

Even then, knowing your “maximum line speed” is about as much use as knowing the top speed of your car: it’s utterly irrelevant. It’s the actual speed of the connection – what people will see in their day-to-day surfing – that really matters.

Then we come to Ofcom’s next masterstroke of forcing broadband providers to “offer an alternative package (if there is one) without any penalties, if the actual speed is a lot lower than the original estimate.”

What does a “lot lower” actually mean? At what point are you within your rights to complain to your ISP and demand to be moved to a cheaper package? We asked Ofcom. It didn’t know. “Ofcom doesn’t define ‘a lot’ lower,” a spokesperson told us. “As a signatory of the Code the ISPs agree to honour the spirit of the Code. This means that the onus is on the ISP to provide the consumer with an alternative package if the consumer believes the speed is significantly lower. “

Brilliant. And what happens when – inevitably – you and the ISP disagree on what constitutes a “significantly lower” speed? “If the ISP doesn’t do this and can’t resolve the situation with the consumer, the consumer is able to take the ISP to the alternative dispute resolution scheme - Cisas or Otelo.”

In other words, buck passed. Ofcom can’t be bothered to define an unacceptable speed (say 20% slower than the ISP’s estimate) so it’s over to Cisas and Otelo. Oh, and good luck with them by the way – it takes them up to eight weeks before they even start looking at complaints, let alone resolving them.

Even if the resolution schemes do eventually rule in your favour, it probably won’t do you any good. As Michael Phillips of comparison site Broadandchoices.co.uk rightly points out: “Directing ISPs to offer lower speed packages for customers unable to achieve the speed they were sold sounds good in principle but it’s important to note that many ISPs only have a single speed offering across their different packages.”

Ofcom’s own Consumer Panel initially recommended that consumers be allowed to break their contract with their ISP if speeds didn’t come up to scratch, but the ever-fearless Ofcom completely ignored this recommendation.

Quite what Which? found in these toothless rules to declare it a “victory” is beyond me. From where I’m standing, it looks more like yet another own goal from the country’s defenceless regulator.