Under rules set by the Ofcom automatic compensation scheme, if your service has stopped working and it is not fully fixed after two full working days, you should receive £9.76 for each calendar day that the service is not repaired
Millions of households should have been paid £114.9million in compensation from their broadband provider in the last year, new research shows.
Under rules set by the Ofcom automatic compensation scheme, if your internet has stopped working and it is not fully fixed after two full working days, you should receive £9.76 for each calendar day that the service is not repaired. If an engineer does not turn up for a scheduled appointment, or it is cancelled with less than 24 hours’ notice, then you are due £30.49 per missed appointment.
Finally, if your new service does not start on a set date that has been agreed by your new provider, you get £6.10 for each calendar day of delay, including the missed start date. Anyone who may have experienced disruption to their service is now being encouraged to check if they should’ve received a payment.
New research from Go.Compare shows more than 3.5 million households in the UK experienced broadband delays, either to the start of their service or while waiting for repairs to take place, according to Go.Compare. However, 91% of UK adults had not heard of the Ofcom broadband automatic compensation scheme.
An estimated 1.4 million users experienced some delay in the start of a new service, equating to over £17.6 million in the last year that should have been automatically paid out as a result. A further 2.1 million had to wait for a repair following a loss of service in the last year. Meanwhile, compensation owed for missed appointments amounted to more than £57 million in the last year. Around 5% of broadband users with providers signed up to the scheme reported experiencing this, equating to 1.2 million households.
Matt Sanders, broadband expert at Go.Compare, said: “The Ofcom automatic compensation scheme is great for users as it promises money back for any problems without having to claim for it yourself. When comparing broadband providers, it’s a good idea to check which ones are signed up to the scheme before committing. For some customers, issues and delays can drag on, with users waiting weeks or even months for repairs or the start of a new service.
“So, in these cases especially, we’re urging everyone to check that they have been fairly compensated for any issues with their service. You should have been automatically compensated, usually via a credit to your account within 30 days of the problem occurring. If this hasn’t happened, you should raise this with your broadband provider, and as a last resort, you can use the Ofcom-approved alternative dispute resolution (ADR) service.”
