State of broadband service a scandal

IT has become all too clear the broadband quality in this county is seriously deficient and requires government intervention.

Regular calls now have to be made by consumers to technical assistant agents, requiring long periods of time to sort out various issues to do with connectivity and overall quality. Technical assistants are putting people through long diagnostic procedures to trace the source of the problem, even though they know that it is most likely to be a major network problem

Even though there are many periods when there is no coverage at all, consumers continue to pay for a service that is not available, with no refund for loss of poor quality of service under any circumstances. The cost of broadband is also a major concern. Broadband services in the UK are three time less expensive than in our own rip-off republic. Broadband can be bought for under £10 a month (€11.60), where as in our own shop of horrors the minimum cost outside NBS rates is around €30 a month, which a scandalous difference for a service that is very unreliable. Broadband services are literally on the “blink” as your modem flashes to tell you that the network is no longer responding properly or not at all. The speed of broadband is also a concern and appears to be going at a snail’s pace compared with the older system that is far quicker as it pans out. Consumers are now being sold very expensive modems with faster download speeds, just to bring web pages up without waiting 30 seconds a page to view information. Many people are also regretting applying for fixed-term contracts for concessions on modem costs and network charges, and are stuck with a shoddy service that is essentially ripping off people who are unable to go elsewhere. It is now necessary to keep or install a standard telephone line socket as a backup for broadband such is the unreliability of broadband. It is time for our supine government to think seriously about the so-called advancement of broadband services in this country which is nothing but a tedious nightmare of technical problems that reoccur again and again.