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Broadband providers - Ofcom program prevents misleading advertising; are services of the quality promised to subscribers?
By admin | June 11, 2008
What’s worse than subscribing for a broadband service and subsequently discovering that its quality does not match up to earlier promises? This type of scenario occurs to subscribers in almost every country, around the world. Ofcom, the United Kingdoms’ communications regulation department, has created a program which attempts to prevent such unpleasing activity by broadband providers.
Ofcom has published a voluntary document of consumer trust, allowing broadband providers to increase consumer trust with this governmental seal of reliance. The program aims to prevent damaging and overly misleading broadband specifications, though it does not extend to the use of exaggerated marketing.
This government commission requires providers to allow mystery shopping, fake subscribers inquiring on speed and quality specifications. This ensures that sales departments do not infringe on the document’s convention, preventing the companies from continuing misleading advertising.
Ofcom’s new policy also offers a valuable complement to the broadband providers also. The commission allows the companies to allow stricter usage guidelines, and support them through systematic governmental backing. Service Providers are also given the permission to deploy protocol throttles, ceasing activity to such IPs as those of BitTorrent and LimeWire.
Due to the voluntary practice involved in this program, signatories who violate the rules of the commission will not be legally penalized, nor monetarily reprimanded.
Topics: Technology |