Virgin Media customers are most likely to experience a problem with their broadband over the last 12 months with issues affecting seven out of 10, according to a Which? survey.
The survey was held with 7,035 customers from June to July this year. It found the most common problems were price increases, slow speeds, connections dropouts and router problems.
The top complaint was price increases with 45 per cent of those surveyed raising the issue. Second is router issues impacting one in five customers (21pc). One in six customers (16pc) said they had been left without an internet connection at all for hours or even days at a time.
TalkTalk’s broadband service proved to be almost as problematic as Virgin’s, with two-thirds (64pc) of customers reporting an issue with its service. The biggest issue for TalkTalk customers was ‘very slow speeds’, with nearly three in 10 (28pc) experiencing the problem.
Sky Broadband customers’ biggest complaint was price increases with 33pc stating the issue, while download speeds fared slightly better than TalkTalk’s. Rochdale-based Zen Internet saw the least complaints in a list full of big players – however, problems still affected a third (33pc) of customers.
Overall, the survey found that most people were suffering from a poor broadband service. Three in five (57pc) British households said they had experienced some kind of issue with their broadband service in the last year.
Ofcom estimates that two in five broadband customers are out of contract and have been rolled on to a higher tariff. Currently, broadband providers are not obliged to notify customers when their contract might be up – some risk being moved onto a poor tariffs.
Which? managing director of home services Alex Neill said: “Year after year customers complain they suffer with shoddy broadband services, with problems ranging from very slow speeds to price hikes and connection dropouts.
