A “Right Match” for High Speed Internet

It has been shown that even though there are large differences between rates among high speed internet service providers, many consumers are subscribing without knowing the details of the service.

Korea Consumer Protection Board (KCPB) announced yesterday, “After surveying 540 people living in the Seoul metropolitan area, results showed that those who knew the fees of their high speed internet service and its contracted time were only 53 percent and 45 percent, respectively.”

Kim Ki-bum, leader of the service research team at KCPB, said, “KT has the highest rate and Onse Telecom has a low one, but in contrast, KT has a low rental charge for modems while Onse Telecom has a high rental charge,” and advised to compare in detail before subscribing. In the case of modems, if the contracted time is for one year, it is more profitable to rent than to buy when considering all the service providers, but for two years, there is more advantage in renting for KT users and buying for Hanaro users.

When there is a service interruption or difficulty for over three hours per day or 12 hours altogether in a month, service providers give compensation and 34.4 percent replied that they had experienced those difficulties but those who actually received compensation were a mere 6.6 percent (a total of eight cases including seven in which the rates were reduced).

Meanwhile, last year’s consumer consultation and relief cases related to high speed internet were 5,676 and 262 cases respectively, with each increasing by 56.2 percent and 54.1 percent respectively compared to the year before.

After KCPB’s analysis of last year’s 262 relief cases, when numbering the relief cases per 100,000 people by the providers, Onse Telecom had the most with 14.67 cases, and Thrunet (3.98 cases), Hanaro (2.70 cases), and KT (0.59 cases) followed.

Na-Yeon Lee larosa@donga.com