|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
UK Awareness and usage of Advanced Telecoms Services Report of Residential Users (Sept 1999) Prepared for Oftel by BMRB International |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Contents INTRODUCTION |
Oftel, the regulator of the UK telecoms market, aims to ensure that customers obtain the best possible deal from telecoms services, primarily through promoting competition in telecoms networks and services. As part of this, Oftel seeks to assess the effectiveness of the UK telecoms market in bringing advanced, innovative, customer focussed services and products to the market place to meet customers demands. Oftel commissioned BMRB to repeat a survey previously conducted in December 1997 by NERA and IFF Research into the awareness, and take-up of advanced telecoms services (fixed, mobile and services over networks) amongst UK businesses and residential users in the UK. As one of the aims of this survey was to compare the findings with those from 1997, where possible the questionnaire this time matched that used previously in all crucial respects. A number of questions were added, to reflect changing areas of interest, and others were adapted or streamlined, where it was felt that their current structure was not ‘respondent friendly’. This was an important consideration as a number the services being researched involved complicated technical phraseology. A copy of the questionnaire used in this survey can be found in the appendices at the end of the report. The sampling frame for the survey of residential users was obtained from CACI. CACI has a database of residential households built up from the census, which provides details of occupier’s name, address and telephone number. Analysis can be carried out at census district level to determine the population density of the district in which each household is located and from samples can be drawn to meet quotas of urbanity by area type. The sample from CACI was specified first by levels of urbanity (rural, suburban, urban), with deliberate over-sampling of rural areas, in order to get a sample sufficiently large for analysis – this was corrected by weighting in the analysis stage. Within urbanity, the sample was specified by 8 regions (Northern England, Midlands, South East England, London, South West England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland). During interviewing, quotas were in operation for urbanity, and minimum targets were set for region. However, due to the difficulties in interviewing in some areas (typically, interviews are more difficult to obtain in urban areas, and in particular in London) a higher proportion of rural interviews was achieved than was originally intended, as shown on the table below. However, this was corrected by weighting. Table 1. Sample of residential users – by urbanity
The survey was conducted using Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing (CATI) at BMRB’s Telephone Centre in Ealing. Interviews were conducted by fully trained interviewers working under supervision to precise instructions, in accordance with the Market Research Society code of conduct, and within the requirements of the Interviewer Quality Control Scheme. Interviewing for the residential survey was conducted between 19th and 31st May. A target of 520 interviews was set and achieved for the residential survey. Interviews were conducted with the person who is responsible for, or normally sees the telephone bill, as these were judged to be the people most likely to make decisions about the telecoms services used in the household. In order to correct for the effects of the sampling and interviewing, it was necessary to apply weighting to the final interviews. As mentioned above, in order to get a sufficient number of interviews in rural areas, these were over sampled, which means that they needed to be weighted back into their natural proportions. In addition, regions were not sampled as they naturally occur, and therefore corrective weighting had to be applied to region as well.
Nine in ten respondents said that they used BT in their home. The next fixed line operator to BT was Cable & Wireless, used by 7% of respondents interviewed. The majority were aware that, in general, competition existed, but specific awareness of alternative suppliers to provide services is quite low – over half of all respondents who use advanced telecoms services could not think of an alternative supplier who could supply all or most of the telecoms services available. It appears that satisfaction with the current supplier is a most common reason for not changing supplier. The picture is rather different in the mobile phone market, where BT/ Cellnet are not the major supplier. Vodafone have a one-third share of customers, with BT/ Cellnet slightly behind this, and Orange and One-2-One sharing the remainder of the market. Satisfaction levels with the range of services provided by the current supplier are very high. However, it is worth noting that satisfaction levels are slightly lower among those with more sophisticated telecoms usage. Most call services available have very high levels of recognition across all levels of society. Call Return and Call Waiting are known by over three-quarters (probably due to extensive promotion) while 76% are aware of alarm calls. Subscriber services (apart from mobile phones and itemised billing) tend to be less well known than the call services. The Internet achieved very high levels of awareness (77% of all respondents). The small bill payers are significantly less likely to be aware of telecom related services, and this is true even of those which could be of benefit to them. Those of lower social grade (D and especially E) are less aware of all services apart from mobile phones. Type of location (urban, suburban, rural) does not appear to be a strong, consistent discriminator, but where differences do exist people in urban and suburban areas are more aware of advanced telecoms services. Respondents aged 65+ are generally less aware of the new services. However there does not exist a simple, linear decrease in awareness as people get older because "middle aged" respondents have highest awareness of some services. People obtained information on telecoms services from a wide range of sources, including BT shops, the telecoms companies themselves, the Yellow pages and telecoms users organisations. As with awareness there is a great variation in the usage of telecoms services ranging from 72% for itemised billing to 1% for ISDN. In terms of major changes since 1997, respondents in 1999 were about five times more likely to use personal numbers and call waiting. Those people in the higher social grades and those in younger age groups tended to use more advanced telecoms services. Furthermore, mirroring the 1997 findings, those with higher quarterly telecoms spend tended to be more likely to use telecoms services. There does not appear to be a strong relationship between usage and location. The relationship between household size and usage of telecoms services does not appear to be straightforward: whilst for some services usage is highest amongst households with five people in, for the majority of services, usage peaks in households with four people in and falls off again in the larger households. The majority of respondents (at least 80% for all call and subscriber services except voice mail and caller number display) stated that their advanced telecoms services were supplied by BT. Competition to BT was particularly noticeable amongst suppliers of the Internet and mobile services. In terms of subscribing to advanced telecoms services, respondents who have heard of the telecoms services, but do not currently use them, stated that they were most likely to be subscribe to the Internet and/or mobile phones, in the next six months. It was found that 25-34 year olds were more than twice as likely as any other age grouping to state that they were likely to subscribe to the internet and purchase a mobile phone over the next six months. It is clear that the majority of the respondents interviewed do not anticipate getting any new telecoms services (that they had heard of but did not use), during the next six months. All respondents who said that they would not get a service were asked the reason for this. Overwhelmingly, the reason given was that they simply did not need to use the service. Compared with the 1997 survey, awareness and usage of advanced telecoms services was higher. (Exceptions are itemised billing and alarm calls). These results are also encouraging as they indicate that not only that awareness of the services is increasing, but usage as well. In terms of awareness personalised ringing tones, personal numbers, the Internet and ISDN showed the largest increases in 1999 compared to the 1997 results. Respondents in 1999 were about five times more likely to use personal numbers and call waiting than respondents in 1997, and twice as likely to use call diversion, call charge advice, personalised ringing tones and the Internet. A significant proportion of all respondents stated that they would subscribe to video on demand (27%), TV Internet (31%) and Fast Internet Access (31%). The majority of respondents who would not subscribe in the future stated that the reason was because they were "not interested/doesn’t appeal". However, among those interested in subscribing price does appear to strongly influence likely take up.
This chapter focuses on the UK telecoms suppliers in general, without referring to specific services. These are included in Chapter 5, after the usage of telecoms services has been discussed. Telecoms suppliers used overall Almost nine in ten (89%) of the respondents in this survey used BT in their home – over ten times more than the next fixed line supplier, Cable & Wireless, used by (7%) of residents. Other fixed line suppliers have much more restricted geographical coverage and consequently only accounted for one or two per cent of residents each. The smaller fixed line operators tend to be based in particular geographical regions and their penetration in the relevant regions would not be picked up by this survey, which aimed to achieve interviews with residential telecoms users across the UK. However, the findings from this survey can give a broad overall view of the telecoms market in the UK. The percentage of respondents using BT as their fixed line supplier was fairly consistent across all geographical regions, (approximately 90%), except for London where only three-quarters of respondents used BT (although note that the base size is low here). In fact, Cable and Wireless was particularly popular in London, where it was used by one in five respondents (21%). There is evidence to suggest that Cabletel in Wales and Telewest in Scotland are the main regional competitors to BT. Though regional base sizes are too small to produce precise market share figures, they are adequate to produce a general indication of the regional picture. Type of location also seemed to impact upon the choice of telecoms suppliers. Residents in rural (99%) and suburban (95%) regions were more likely than urban residents (88%) to use BT as their fixed line supplier. Urban residents (7%) were twice as likely to use Cable and Wireless than rural (4%) or suburban (4%) respondents. In terms of quarterly telecoms spend groupings it is interesting to note that respondents who spent more than £100 on telecoms per quarter (13%) were twice as likely to use Cable and Wireless as smaller spenders (4% - 7%). 8% of respondents told us that they used more than one supplier "in their home". Table 3a Suppliers of telecoms services used at home
Out of these 190 respondents who used mobile phones, 33% used Vodafone, 30% used BT Cellnet, and Orange and One-2-One each supplied 15% of mobile phone users. Due to the fact that we are dealing with small figures, regional subgroup analyses is not possible. Overall there are no discernible significant differences across subgroups. Table 3b Suppliers of mobile telecoms services
Available SuppliersKnowledge about the existence of competition was good, with two thirds of respondents who said they had only one telecoms supplier saying that there was a choice of suppliers available to them. Only 18% of respondents said that they had more than one fixed line supplier in their household – these people tended to be in the top telecoms spend groups, aged under 44 years old and from the ABC1 social grades. All respondents using any of the services listed, were asked whether they could think of any other telecoms suppliers who could supply all or most of the services they used, which could also provide a useful indication of awareness of alternative telecoms suppliers. Almost half (49%) of respondents who used any of the advanced telecoms services could not think of any other suppliers who could supply the services they used. The results can be seen on table 3c below. The suppliers named most frequently were Cable & Wireless (19%), BT (13%) and Mercury (7%). As these companies provide national coverage (even if Mercury is now part of Cable & Wireless) it might be expected that respondents would be aware of them and the services they provide. Overall, however, it would appear that consumers are not particularly aware of the alternatives available to them in the residential telecoms market. Table 3c Alternative suppliers of telecoms services Base: All who use services (458)
Those respondents who used any of the services were asked why they did not change their supplier. Over half of all respondents (57%) said that they were satisfied with their current supplier or saw no reason to change their supplier, and 6% said that their current supplier was the best value for money. Inertia could be a factor preventing change: 9% said changing supplier would cause too much disruption/hassle while a further 9% said that they could not be bothered/weren’t interested. Comments such as these suggest that whilst some people may not explicitly say that they are satisfied with their supplier, nor are they particularly dissatisfied. Further, this could also explain why so few respondents could name any alternative suppliers – if they have no need to change supplier, they are not likely to need to know alternatives. There are some important differences between different sub groups that it is worth noting: older (55+) respondents, with low telecoms spend (less than £50 per quarter) and social grades DE were most likely to say that they would not change supplier because they are satisfied with the current supplier. High spending ABs were more likely than other respondents to say that they would not change their telecoms supplier because it would cause too much hassle/disruption or because they weren’t interested/can’t be bothered. 15% of respondents living in rural areas said that they would not change because they didn’t have a choice, compared with only 4% nationally. Satisfaction with range of services provided by current supplier All respondents were asked about their level of satisfaction with the range of services provided by their current supplier. As the figures below show, the picture shows very little dissatisfaction. Table 5l Satisfaction with range of service from current supplier Base: All respondents (520)
Though satisfaction levels are very high, it is interesting to note that they are highest among those groups with lowest usage and awareness of advanced telecoms services, such as older people, social grades DE, single person households and those with low telecoms spend. Among younger, more upmarket groups with higher telecoms spend we find that satisfaction levels are slightly lower. This may be due to greater awareness of the full range of technology in existence and/ or a better understanding about what is on offer from competitors to the current supplier. Respondents in general were satisfied with their current telecoms supplier: 97% of respondents were satisfied (60% were very satisfied). There was an indication that respondents interviewed in London were slightly less satisfied with their telecoms service. Though the London base is small, and thus the figures should be treated with some caution, such a finding is not unusual, as London residents often do report lower levels of satisfaction, in all kinds of surveys. There have been various explanations put forward for this tendency, with most focusing on factors such as the capital’s relatively upmarket socio-economic profile, the plethora of marketing information and the greater choice available, leading to higher expectations. As such a high proportion of respondents were ‘satisfied’ with their supplier, it is only by looking at the ‘very satisfieds’ alone that differences can be seen. As would be expected, the over 65s and social grade E respondents were most likely to be ‘very satisfied’ with their current supplier. Those least likely to be ‘very satisfied’ were those spending more than £100 each quarter on their telecoms bill, and those in the 25-34 age group. BT is the major supplier in the residential telecoms market, and nine in ten respondents in our survey said that they used BT in their home. The next fixed line operator to BT was Cable & Wireless, used by 7% of respondents interviewed. The majority of respondents were aware that, in general, competition existed, but specific awareness of alternative suppliers to provide services is quite low, although almost a fifth (18%) of respondents interviewed said that they used two or more suppliers in their home. Half of all respondents who use advanced telecoms services could not think of an alternative supplier who could supply all or most of the telecoms services that they used. Residential telecoms users are extremely satisfied with the telecoms service provided by their current supplier – 97% were satisfied with the service provided, and 'satisfaction with current supplier’ was given by 57% of respondents as the reason why they did not want to change suppliers. The picture is rather different in the mobile phone market, where BT Cellnet is not the major supplier. Vodafone have a one-third share of customers, with BT Cellnet slightly behind this, and Orange and One-2-One sharing the remainder of the market. Satisfaction levels with the range of services provided by the current supplier are very high. However, it is worth noting that satisfaction levels are slightly lower among those with more sophisticated telecoms usage.
Awareness of telecoms services
This chapter examines the level of awareness the survey respondents had of the advanced telecoms services available to them, looking at awareness in general and then amongst the sub groups by: telecoms spend, social grade and location (rural/ urban/ suburban). Where appropriate, comparisons will be made with the 1997 survey. Table 4a Overall awareness of advanced telecoms services Base: All respondents 520 (520)
In general, awareness of services available is high, with the great majority being known to at least half of respondents. Aside from the mobile phone, respondents were most likely to have heard of Call Return (85% aware) and Itemised billing (85%), which have been available to most households for a number of years. Alarm calls (76%) and Call Waiting (74%) and the Internet (77%) also received a high level of awareness, although many fewer were aware of ISDN (34%). Around a half of respondents had heard of subscriber services such as personal numbers, radio paging and voice mail. There was no real difference in awareness between the two different types of calling card services. Only one service – Automatic Call Reject – was known to fewer than a third of respondents, and it was generally the case that the lesser known services and products tend to be the least established. In comparison with 1997, awareness of most services has increased, although there has been a fall in awareness for itemised billing, alarm calls and call waiting. It could be that at the time of the previous survey, these services had recently been promoted by the telecoms suppliers and awareness has subsequently fallen away as publicity has reduced. Where an increase in awareness has occurred, this has tended not to be very big, although as awareness of many services was already quite high in 1997, it was likely that further increases in awareness would be gradual. There are, therefore, only a handful of services where the increase in awareness has been particularly dramatic: personalised ringing tones (up from 16% to 54%), personal numbers (from 20% to 41%,) the Internet (up from 59% to 77%) and ISDN (from 20% to 34%). In general, those respondents with a very low telecoms spend (less than £50 a quarter) are far less aware of advanced telecoms services. This difference is more pronounced in connection with the very well known services (Call Return, Mobile phones) and those which are aimed at households who make a lot of calls, particularly Call Diversion and Ring Back When Free. Those with a lower telecoms spend are likely to find this type of service less relevant and thus have lower awareness. However, those with medium to high spends (£50-£99) were more aware of these advanced services than the top spenders, those with quarterly bills of over £100. This effect is greater for the lower profile services such as Call Charge Advice and Automatic Call Reject. Table 4b over leaf shows awareness for all the telecoms services amongst the four telecoms spend subgroups. Table 4b Awareness – Call Services: Telecoms Spend
We can see that in 1997 awareness tended to "step up" with telecoms expenditure. In 1999 this tendency remains, and indeed appears to be more marked. Specialist services such as ISDN elicit a greater difference in awareness between the low and high spenders. Only a quarter of those in the lower group were aware of ISDN in contrast to two thirds of those who spend between £80 and a £100 per quarter. ABC1’s have a greater awareness across the whole range of advanced telecoms services available. Respondents of social grade D tend to have a similar level of awareness, as C2’s, however those of social grade E (reliant on state benefits) have a far lower awareness of nearly all of the services available to them. Table 4c Awareness – Call Services: Social Grade
The lack of awareness shown by those in-group E is very apparent in reference to call services. Some of these services such as pre-pay advice may be particularly relevant to those on lower incomes, therefore this situation may be concerning from a social policy point of view. Table 4d Awareness – Subscriber, Access and Mobile Services: Social Grade
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
