Internet service firms hard to contact and difficult to swap

Internet service firms hard to contact and difficult to swap, Consumer NZ says

By Sophie Boot

Feb. 3 (BusinessDesk) - Big telecommunications retailers Vodafone New Zealand and Spark New Zealand rub their internet customers up the wrong way by being difficult to contact, but people stick with them all the same as it's too hard to compare services, according to a survey by Consumer NZ.

A survey of the consumer lobby's 8,600 members ranked 12 internet providers, with Spark and Vodafone customers the least happy.

Vodafone fared worst in the survey, with just 30 percent of 3,000 customers satisfied, compared to an average of 44 percent across all providers. A satisfied ranking shows the percentage who rated their provider 8, 9 or 10 on a scale from 0 to 10, with 0 being very dissatisfied and 10 being very satisfied.

More than a quarter of Vodafone customers did not feel they were getting good value for money, and 51 percent felt the company was not easy to contact, with long wait times when calling customer service.

Spark also fared poorly, with just 35 percent of 3,400 customers satisfied with the country's biggest telecommunications company. Some 45 percent of customers found Spark hard to contact, and about a third felt they were not getting good value for money.

Despite dissatisfaction, most respondents had been with the same provider for at least two years, with about 60 percent staying for five years or more, and only 12 percent very likely to change in the next 12 months. This was not down to loyalty so much as companies making it difficult for consumers to compare and switch between providers, the consumer group said. About 53 percent of respondents were finding it hard to compare services while 37 percent said it was difficult to switch.

The happiest customers were with smaller companies, although there were fewer of their customers surveyed. Of Manawatu-based company Inspire Net's 113 customers surveyed, 98 percent were satisfied with the service; Now NZ, which is 26 percent owned by Spark, had an 88 percent satisfaction rate over its 72 customers surveyed.

Nearly 40 percent of respondents said they were very likely to move to an ultra-fast broadband plan, and 17 percent had already made the switch.

The major telecommunications providers performed better on mobile, although they still lagged behind average. An average of 49 percent of consumers felt "very satisfied" with the services they were getting across all providers; for Spark, this dropped to 41 percent, and 42 percent for Vodafone.

Spark offshoot Skinny Mobile fared better, with 84 percent of customers very satisfied, and 86 percent feeling they were getting value for money. Two Degrees Mobile showed 69 percent of customers very satisfied, and 63 percent happy with value for money.

Customers on pre-pay plans were more likely to be happy with their value for money, Consumer NZ said. All Skinny customers, and 57 percent of 2degrees customers, were on pre-pay plans, with most spending $30 or less per month.

When it comes to online video streaming, Netflix was the clear winner in subscriber satisfaction. Some 54 percent of Netflix subscribers were happy with the service, compared with a quarter of those using Lightbox, 18 percent of Sky Network Television's Neon subscribers and 17 percent of Quickflix users. The survey was done in November, prior to Netflix's announcement it was cracking down on subscribers using international versions of the service to access geoblocked content last month.

(BusinessDesk)

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