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Posted on July 27th, 2010 by Barry Collins
The word Ofcom won’t use about ISPs: liars
The first rule of every media legal training session I’ve ever attended is: never call companies liars. Yet what other word could you use to describe an entire industry that has systematically misled the public for years?
Ofcom chief executive Ed Richards would certainly never use the L word when referring to ISPs. He’s far too cautious for that. Yet, even he admitted for the first time yesterday that ISPs have been selling consumers broadband speeds that they couldn’t possibly achieve.
“Speeds should only be advertised if they’re achievable by some customers,” Richards proclaimed, referring to the invidious practice of selling broadband based on theoretical maximums rather than actual throughput. “Clearly ‘up to’ claims are not as clear as they should be.”
The 115-page report on UK broadband speeds makes it perfectly clear that the ISPs have been over-egging their speeds. “In practice, advertised headline ‘up to’ speeds are rarely delivered,” Ofcom states. “Our present research found that the overall average download speed delivered to UK residential consumers was 5.2Mbits/sec, only 45% of the average headline speed of ‘up to’ 11.5Mbits/sec”.
In some cases, it’s not the case that headline speeds are “rarely delivered” – they’re simply impossible to achieve. On “up to 8Mbits/sec” BT connections (either direct from the company itself or via an ISP that rents lines off BT), for example, the maximum possible throughput is 7.2Mbits/sec.
“If a line synchronises at 8,128Kbits/sec (~8Mbits/sec), systems such as the BT Broadband Remote Access Server (BRAS) system limit user traffic to 7.15Mbits/sec,” Ofcom’s report states, confirming what anyone who’s ever looked at their modem synch-speed will have known for years.
Likewise, “up to 24Mbits/sec” ADSL2+ lines will never provide actual throughput greater than 21Mbits/sec (as PlusNet explains here), which is why some of the more honest ISPs sell ADSL2+ as “up to 20Mbits/sec”.
So if Ofcom won’t use the L word, and my lawyers won’t let me use it either, what word should we use to describe such sharp practice?
Tags: broadband, ISPs, Ofcom, speeds
Posted in: Newsdesk
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16 Responses to “ The word Ofcom won’t use about ISPs: liars ”
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July 27th, 2010 at 1:01 pm
Well speeds are always marked as “up to” which at least is there. I think it’s far worse to sell broadband as “unlimited” when clearly it’s not.
July 27th, 2010 at 3:45 pm
@Rowan Parker
Absolutely correct. You can’t event take the word “unlimited” two ways. It literally means “no limits”. Or are the ASA saying that they know the definition better than the OED? This will be the reason I finally leave Orange when my contract is up in a few months.
July 27th, 2010 at 3:49 pm
Just goes to show where Oftel’s priorities are though – certainly not with the consumer. Having been finally forced to admit that an “up to” figure that could never actually obtained by anyone is (ahem) a terminological inexactitude (that OK with the lawyers?), their first reaction is to go with the maximum figure that could possibly be justified, never mind it is still completely useless to the consumer. As long an a single customer can get that speed once in a blue moon – what use is that practically?
If they had any concern at all for the customer, they would mandate a industry standard speed measure that actually gave a useful comparison of performance between providers. Say the average speed experienced by 50% of the customers 50% of the time.
It would also be useful if they forced ISPs to state a minimum speed below which the customer would be entitled to break their contract with a full refund.
July 27th, 2010 at 7:14 pm
It is unfair to call them liars. They are simply big businesses getting away with whatever they are allowed to. It is the fault of Ofcom who are in their pockets who are to blame
July 27th, 2010 at 11:09 pm
“Up to” just means “not exceeding”. A shop advertising “up to 50% off” doesn’t have to sell anthing that is actually “50% off”.
Ofcom are finally trying to get a voluntary agreement to switch to a “typical speed range” figure rather than an “up to” theoretical maximum figure.
This sort of rationalization is way overdue and it isn’t even going to be backed up with any sanctions as it is just a voluntary agreement.
July 28th, 2010 at 11:18 am
The IT industry is full of these marketing hyperbole over factual statements, even going as far as redefining terms. How many bytes in your terabyte drive anyone?
@Simon Jones
I think a shop advertising “up to 50% off” would need to sell at least one item to not fall foul of the law.
July 28th, 2010 at 6:45 pm
What really surprises me is that it took a 115 page report to find this out!! Anyone with half a brain has known for years that ‘headline’ rates are impossible to achieve on real world connections. How much did this report cost? Can we deduct it from the collective OFCOM bonus pot (they are bound to have one).
July 29th, 2010 at 8:17 am
It would be simpler to legislate that companies must advertise using the ‘down to’ speed. If they are forced to advertise the slowest speed their system will give, perhaps they won’t oversubscribe their lines and actually improve the service.
July 29th, 2010 at 8:26 am
Why is there never a mention, or comparison with Satellite Broadband ?
A ‘LOT’ of people would benefit by using Sat.BB.
Is it never considered because of the Up and Down-load speeds ?
Is it because BT does NOT have the Monopoly with Sat.BB. ?
The cost involved would come down, as the number of users went up, I am sure of that.
We could ALL dispense with the Copper Cable Mafia then couldn’t we ?
July 29th, 2010 at 11:03 am
David Anderson Says:”It is unfair to call them liars.”
As Barry says, how else can you describe someone who is lying? What about “Up to 100% liars”
July 29th, 2010 at 1:06 pm
“As Barry says, how else can you describe someone who is lying? What about “Up to 100% liars””
Given some of the other comments, would it not be better to describe ISP’s as “down to 100% liars”, or just liars, because the lying isp’s ARE liars.
July 29th, 2010 at 6:29 pm
I am disappointed you do not underline the positives; namely Virgin Media’s cable network performance.
July 29th, 2010 at 6:29 pm
What about a positive mention for Virgin media’s cable broadband performance
July 29th, 2010 at 7:16 pm
Why doesn’t everybody just complain to the ASA who control advertising? Just click on the link and tell them that any ISP ad you see in the paper – Sky, TalkTalk, BT – are all dishonest and they should do something about it.
http://www.asa.org.uk/Complaints-and-ASA-action/How-to-complain/Online-Form.aspx
July 30th, 2010 at 9:40 am
Vincent – we wrote a story about Virgin’s performance here: http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/broadband/359782/virgin-broadband-three-times-faster-than-adsl
July 30th, 2010 at 6:10 pm
The public’s attitude to advertising is partly to blame if the slogan “NEVER LESS than xMbits/sec” is avoided by the ISPs. After all (EN/ISO)”average” contents of packages also defy verification.