Internet users unhappy with ISPs

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Nearly half of the UK’s internet users are unhappy with their internet service providers (ISP), a survey by uSwitch has shown.

The 12,054 respondents to the survey, commissioned by uSwitch and carried out by YouGov, said they prefer the smaller ISPs to the market leaders.

The report said that "over half – 54 per cent – of those surveyed don't think they're getting the best deal from their provider and the customer satisfaction gap between the best and worst providers was wider than ever.”

Three ISPs, which own 50 per cent of the broadband market, lined the bottom of the survey results. Just 60 per cent of respondents would recommend BT to a friend, while just 52 per cent would have recommended Orange and only 49 per cent would have recommended AOL.

Overall approval ratings were slightly higher with 74 per cent for BT, 70 per cent for Orange and 66 per cent for AOL, but it appears many customers see smaller ISPs offering better service.

The top ranked service was from O2, with 92 per cent of respondents saying they were happy overall. The company came top in nine out of 11 categories it was judged in.

Other high scorers included PlusNet with 88 per cent overall satisfaction and Sky with 87 per cent.

Nearly all the nine suppliers scored around the 50 per cent mark for customer service and technical support but they all did well in the “ease to start using the provider” and “quality of information provided during the switch” categories.

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