01.Introduction

In July this year, 3870 subscribers took part in our biannual survey of internet service providers, answering questions about the quality of service, performance, cost, and support of the ISPs and their associated services.

Findings in brief

• Overall, respondents' satisfaction with their internet service providers has dropped from 41% in 2005 to 29% in 2007.
• The biggest issue is the price of access, still a competitive factor between services.
• ADSL broadband connections account for half of all internet connections surveyed.
• ADSL2/2+ users were more likely to be very satisfied overall.
• ADSL2/2+ users were more likely to be very satisfied with their connection speed.
• Cable users were generally only fairly satisfied overall.
• Telstra BigPond users were more likely to be fairly dissatisfied with the total cost of their account.

The full survey results show which ISPs performed best and how satisfied users were with service, speed, costs and billing.

Broadband and ADSL

Broadband saw an impressive uptake compared to our last survey, with standard ADSL being the most common type of internet access and accounting for half of all connections. By contrast, cable broadband accounts for 23% while ADSL2 and ADSL2+ account for 13%. The use of dial-up has fallen dramatically from 47% to 8% of all connections in the survey. Wireless and satellite broadband remain relatively unpopular and only account for a tiny 2% each.

Sticking with who you know

When it comes to choosing an ISP, respondents tend to favour the provider they know — more than one-third chose their ISP because it was already their phone or pay TV provider. This explains why Telstra BigPond is the most common ISP and accounts for 33% of all connections, followed by Optusnet (19%), iiNet (12%), Internode (5%) and AAPT (4%). A significant 58% bundle their internet with other services and almost all of these (93%) are home phone and internet bundles. But word of mouth is also important and 17% of respondents chose their provider based on a friend or relative’s recommendation, while only 10% made their choice by searching the internet themselves.

Sharing and wireless

Internet sharing is relatively popular and just over half of respondents (53%) share their internet across more than one computer and just under half (43%) use a wireless access point in their home.

Loyalty

In terms of loyalty, almost all respondents (90%) hadn’t changed their ISP in the previous 12 months, though this could also be a reflection of lock-in contracts. When they do change, it’s because they’ve found a better plan, a faster service or they’re upgrading from dial-up to broadband.

Our respondents

Our thanks go to the 3870 members who filled out the survey in July 2007. Respondents were asked about their home internet access and rated the occurrence of problems from 'never' to 'often'. They rated their satisfaction with various aspects of their internet service from 'very dissatisfied' or 'fairly dissatisfied' to 'fairly satisfied' or 'very satisfied'.

The overall score in the results table shows the proportion of respondents who were 'very satisfied'.

ISPs included in the table were rated by at least 30 respondents in the survey. Where we have singled out a specific ISP in the report, it's because the provider performed statistically better or worse than the average in the section of the survey being discussed.