Best UK Internet Broadband Service Provider

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Who is the Best UK Internet Broadband Service Provider?

This is one of the most frequently asked questions and searches on google.

The UK broadband market is very competitive. The majority of broadband providers are LLU operators using the same BT Openreach infrastructure and therefore the differentiator between service providers is customer service and satisfaction.

Ofcom, the UK Telecoms regulator monitors and conducts research into the levels of customer service and satisfaction across the ‘main’ communications service providers in the UK.

The main communication service providers are those with a market share of 4% and above. The UK Broadband suppliers that were reviewed in the latest OfCom report were BT, Plusnet, Virgin Media, SKY, EE, TalkTalk, Vodafone and KCOM.

Table of Contents

We have reviewed the latest Ofcom report (Updated May 2021) and broken it down into a simple to digest summary.

Broadband Customer Service

¹⁰ In March 2021 Post Office completed the sale of its broadband and landline services to Shell Energy and exited the telecoms market.

Ofcom Summary

Eight in ten broadband customers reported that they were satisfied with their service overall.
Overall satisfaction levels were broadly similar across all providers.
TalkTalk customers were less satisfied with the speed of their service compared to the market average. Satisfaction with the speed of broadband service was in line with the average across all other providers.
Nearly four in five broadband customers were satisfied with the reliability of their service and there were no differences among the provider on this measure.
EE customers were more likely than average to recommend their broadband provider to a friend, while the scores of all the other broadband providers were in line with the sector average.¹¹

Best UK Internet Broadband Service Provider

Source: Ofcom Customer Satisfaction Tracker 2021.

Complaints and complaints handling

Figure 7: Handling of broadband complaints

Source: Ofcom Complaints Handling Tracker 2020 (see Note F in Annex 1 for more information)

Summary

A quarter (26%) of broadband customers had a reason to complain about their service in 2020.
BT broadband customers were significantly less likely than the market average to have a reason to complain, while Virgin Media and Vodafone customers were significantly more likely than average to have a reason to complain.¹²
As in 2019, the most common reason for customers to complain about their fixed broadband was a service issue (76%), such as slow broadband speeds or an intermittent or total loss of service. This was followed by a billing, pricing or payment issue (18%) and dissatisfaction with customer service (12%).
About half (52%) of broadband customers who made a complaint to their provider in 2020 were satisfied with the way their complaint was handled. This is in line with our 2019 findings. Sky performed better than the sector average, while TalkTalk and Virgin Media were below the average. EE had a significant decline in satisfaction compared to 2019 (47% vs. 66%).
Nearly two in five (37%) broadband complaints were completely resolved on first contact, unchanged since 2019.
Sky was more likely than the broadband sector average to have resolved a complaint completely on first contact, while Plusnet and TalkTalk were less likely than the market average to have done so.

¹¹ The average ‘recommend to a friend’ score in the broadband market was 3. BT (4), EE (11) Plusnet (1), Sky (5), TalkTalk (1) and Virgin Media (1) have ‘recommend to a friend’ scores that are between 0 and 50 and therefore considered ‘good’ based on global NPS standards.
¹² Ofcom Reason to Complain Tracker 2020.

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Complaints to Ofcom

Broadband complaints per 100,000 subscribers: 2020

EE generated the fewest broadband complaints to Ofcom per 100,000 subscribers, while Vodafone generated the most for the second year in a row.

Among the major broadband providers, the average number of broadband complaints per 100,000 subscribers fell from 52 in 2019 to 50 in 2020.

Source: Ofcom, 2020. All figures are rounded to the nearest whole number; the industry average relates only to the providers included in the analysis. The actual measurable difference between Plusnet and Virgin Media, and the industry average and BT broadband complaints per 100,000 subscribers is less than one, so their results should be considered comparable