Telkom ADSL speed complaint
The Advertising Standards Authority of South Africa (ASASA) has dismissed a complaint from a Telkom 4Mbps ADSL subscriber who felt that he did not get the speed which he paid for.
Arthur van Zyl lodged a complaint with the ASA, arguing that Telkom is misleading the public because the company is not delivering the speeds which it promises.
According to van Zyl his real world speed was only 160kbps despite being subscribed to a 4096kbps ADSL line.
Telkom responded, saying that many factors outside of its control can influence the speed of an ADSL connection. These factors include climate, the distance between the customer’s location and the nearest interchange, the quality of the copper cabling, and other geographical factors.
“As a result, all advertising promotes a ‘best effort’ scenario,” Telkom told the ASA. Telkom added that its reference to “fast” in association with Internet access was justified, as it was a comparison to traditional dial-up connectivity.
The ASA previously ruled that, because the vast majority of Telkom’s customers would be able to achieve the claimed ADSL speeds, it is satisfied that this complaint relates to personalised and isolated factors.
The ASA cited a report by Frost & Sullivan which stated that “the connection speeds claimed in Telkom’s DSL adverts can be achieved and the tests conducted indicate that they can be achieved by more than 80% of Telkom’s subscriber base for its 4096kbps, 512kbps and 384kbps product offering”.
The ASA subsequently dismissed the complaint.
DSL Speeds
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