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Virgin Media backs bid to stop 'broadband con'

by Sarah Griffiths on 18 November 2010, 11:10

Tags: Virgin (NASDAQ:VMED)

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Consumer champion?

Virgin Media has urged customers to demand an end to misleading broadband advertising and has thrown its weight behind an online petition.

The ISP has sided with consumers and their beef about some ISPs touting broadband speeds of ‘up to' 20MB for example, but delivering an average speed of 6.5Mb. It is now backing an online campaign called www.stopthebroadbandcon.org to let frustrated web users support a call for broadband providers to publish the real speeds they deliver to customers.

Of course while Virgin Media's aim is admirable, it does have a vested interest in positioning itself as a consumer champion. The firm has been at loggerheads with BT over service speeds for a while and would seem to have the upper hand. It also does not appear to have been fined for misleading advertising either like BT.

"People are paying for superfast broadband but receiving a service stuck in the slow lane. Broadband providers need to stop advertising speeds that not a single customer can receive and we're asking people to support our call for change by signing up to stopthebroadbandcon.org," said Jon James, executive director of broadband at Virgin Media.

"Faster broadband means better broadband, whether you're surfing the web, watching TV online or downloading music and UK consumers deserve superfast broadband they can trust, rather than having to rely on the fairytales and broken promises of current broadband advertising," he added.

Richard Branson, the founder of the Virgin Group, said:"Staying connected is central to our lives and we all deserve broadband we can trust. I'm challenging all broadband providers to be honest with their customers and ask people to add their voice to the campaign by signing up to Stopthebroadbandcon.org."

The online petition has launched today and lets users test their own broadband speed and compare it to the speed advertised (and the one they are paying for) from their ISP. The speed advertising issue is already being investigated by the Advertising Standards Authority.

According to a recent survey by ICM, nine out of 10 people find current broadband advertising misleading, with nearly 70 percent of people are miffed with ISPs that do not keep their speed promises.

While 93 percent of people think advertising speed claims should have to reflect the reality for most customers, Virgin Media has already started to publish the average speeds its customers receive each month across its 10Mb, 20Mb and 50Mb services.

HEXUS Forums :: 11 Comments

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Posted by miniyazz - Thu 18 Nov 2010 13:32
Virgin Media has already started to publish the average speeds its customers receive each month across its 10Mb, 20Mb and 50Mb services.

Mean, median or mode? While a good idea in principle, I could see this giving an incentive to providers not to supply any broadband at all to those living more than a certain distance from the exchange, to keep their numbers up.
Posted by Lee H - Thu 18 Nov 2010 13:44
Virgin are having a laugh aren't they?

their 50 Mb service at the moment is woefully shocking between 5pm and 12am due to their new traffic management policy.

EVERYTHING no matter what the traffic is be it usenet, steam downloads or even FTP transfers is peaking at 250 Kb/s maximum and as the 50 Mb line is as much use as a chocolate fireguard for anything between these times when most people are using their connection for playing games or things like this.

Their forum is full of people complaining now regarding this and even their staff didn't know it was implemented on the 50 Mb after saying there is no traffic shaping on their XXL service.
Posted by oolon - Thu 18 Nov 2010 13:49
I wish virgin would get their house in order first. For a start I wish they would stop calling it “fibre optic broadband”, it is not “firer optic”, the trunk to the street might be but my house isn't. I am moving from one house in London to another a few streets away, when i put my new street post code into virgin. They tell me there isn't cable! Which is strange go look outside my house see hole cover call “CATV”, check houses on street others have cable external boxes too! So decide to phone Virgin, I wish I had not! Call centre in India, idiot with a script on the line. First he tells me he can move my services even if they don't serve the area by installing a BT line, omits he cannot do the TV section of my service via that system, when i pulled him up on that later he said well you stopped me getting to that, lying GIT! Keeps going on about how it must be on the “Fibre optic broadband”, to be able to provide any services, I say I get cable already at my current house that isn't “fibre” it was installed before “fibre to cabinette” as well. Guy tells me well if we give you a service it must be! Can't I just have an “old” style connection? Anyway long and short of it, he is getting someone to come out to the area to check if they can provide “Fibre optic broadband” at my address, even though someone previously has had cable TV at the property! You would have thought they wanted a 90-100 quid a month customer, tempted by Sky+BE however that would be 20 quid more a month for what I get. :wallbash:
Posted by Cozwin - Thu 18 Nov 2010 14:33
oolon
I wish virgin would get their house in order first. For a start I wish they would stop calling it “fibre optic broadband”, it is not “firer optic”, the trunk to the street might be but my house isn't. I am moving from one house in London to another a few streets away, when i put my new street post code into virgin. They tell me there isn't cable! Which is strange go look outside my house see hole cover call “CATV”, check houses on street others have cable external boxes too! So decide to phone Virgin, I wish I had not! Call centre in India, idiot with a script on the line. First he tells me he can move my services even if they don't serve the area by installing a BT line, omits he cannot do the TV section of my service via that system, when i pulled him up on that later he said well you stopped me getting to that, lying GIT! Keeps going on about how it must be on the “Fibre optic broadband”, to be able to provide any services, I say I get cable already at my current house that isn't “fibre” it was installed before “fibre to cabinette” as well. Guy tells me well if we give you a service it must be! Can't I just have an “old” style connection? Anyway long and short of it, he is getting someone to come out to the area to check if they can provide “Fibre optic broadband” at my address, even though someone previously has had cable TV at the property! You would have thought they wanted a 90-100 quid a month customer, tempted by Sky+BE however that would be 20 quid more a month for what I get. :wallbash:

Humm bizarre must vary area to area as my house has cable right up to the house as does most other peoples i know on VM.
Posted by Cozwin - Thu 18 Nov 2010 14:37
Lee @ SCAN;2007312
Virgin are having a laugh aren't they?

their 50 Mb service at the moment is woefully shocking between 5pm and 12am due to their new traffic management policy.

EVERYTHING no matter what the traffic is be it usenet, steam downloads or even FTP transfers is peaking at 250 Kb/s maximum and as the 50 Mb line is as much use as a chocolate fireguard for anything between these times when most people are using their connection for playing games or things like this.

Their forum is full of people complaining now regarding this and even their staff didn't know it was implemented on the 50 Mb after saying there is no traffic shaping on their XXL service.

I cant talk for 50mb as i only have 20, but i would suspect that ever a managed 50mb service is insanely fast. But on my 20mb connection no matter what time of day i do a speed test it is 19mb out of 20mb, lowest i have ever had it is 15mb… so i really do not see your problem….all isps manage and throttle whether they admit it or not, sky and BE are both great at doing this with BT being the worst.

As for forum full of people complaining… check every isp… its all the same because people complain about not having amazing connections when they don't realise how many people in their area are on Virgin and they switch back to adsl and realise what a true crap connection is like, my dad pays for 16mb with BE he is only 1km away from exchange and only gets 5mb….. now if that isn't a ‘throttle’ i dont know what is, but that is just because the bt cable sucks there.

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