Broadband and home phone customers whose appointments and repairs are delayed would receive automatic compensation under proposals published by regulator Ofcom today.
Under the new rules, which are subject to consultation, delays in repairing services would see customers paid £10 per day from the third day, £30 per missed appointment and £6 per day for the delayed start of services.
Such payments would be an automatic entitlement paid either as a cash payment or as a credit on a bill.
According to the regulator, the rules would mean an additional 2.6 million customers get compensation each year.
Lindsey Fussell, Ofcom’s Consumer Group Director, said: “When a customer’s landline or broadband goes wrong, that is frustrating enough without having to fight tooth and nail to get fair compensation from the provider.
“So we’re proposing new rules to force providers to pay money back to customers automatically, whenever repairs or installations don’t happen on time, or when people wait in for an engineer who doesn’t turn up.
“This would mean customers are properly compensated, while providers will want to work harder to improve their service.”
Major ISPs, including BT, Sky and Virgin Media, have put forward their own proposals to introduce automatic compensation through a draft voluntary industry code of practice. However Ofcom says this approach fails to meet its concerns.