Rural customers pay more and get less from telecoms companies supplying them with broadband internet services.
That is according to the Commerce Commission’s latest Annual Telecommunications Monitoring Report.
It puts the spotlight on rural services for the first time.
It finds the 13% of New Zealanders living in more rural areas outside the national fibre footprint are likely to have significantly lower performing broadband services that are more expensive compared with urban areas.
The Telecommunications Commissioner, Tristan Gilbertson, says there is a clear disparity in performance and cost between urban and rural areas.
“If you live in a rural area, your basic copper connection, averaging 9 Mbps, will cost about the same as what someone in the main centres pays for a 300 Mbps fibre plan," he says.
Gilbertson adds copper and 4G wireless broadband services are not just slower and more expensive in rural areas, but they are more likely to have data caps, in contrast with unlimited data elsewhere.
Other information from the report shows copper connections losing their historic legacy by slipping below 50% of all rural connections.
Satellite connections have taken up the balance, with the Commission calling them a "game changer" for the rural public.
But this has not fixed the affordability problem.
"If you’re in an urban area, you can get a high-performing Fibre 300 plan at a cost of between 1.1 % to 1.7% of the average household income," Gilbertson says .
"But if you’re in a rural area, that same level of spend will only get a basic copper connection, while a service that is closer to the urban experience, will cost around 2% to 3% of the average household income.”
But Gilbertson says there could be hope in the future, with competition likely to heat up with more service from satellites, and incentives to roll out fibre to more of the country.
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