No Love for the Big Internet Service Providers

It’s the time of the year when the results come out for the American Customer Satisfaction Index that asks customers to rate their satisfaction with a wide range of industries and the larger companies within those industries. This is a huge nationwide poll that ranks the public’s satisfaction with 400 large companies in 45 sectors. As has been happening for many years, the large Internet Service Providers (ISPs) come in dead last when comparing ISPs to 44 other industries. ISPs were given an overall customer service ranking of 64. The industries ranked just above ISPs at the bottom were related, with subscription TV services (66) and video-on-demand services (68). This puts ISPs below gas stations (68), hospitals (69), and the US Post Office (70). What I find most amazing about this ranking is how politicians have fought so hard and often to protect these companies from regulation. Maybe it’s just me, but I’ve always thought that a state politician running to strongly regulate the biggest cable company in a state would gain a lot of votes.

[Doug Dawson is president of CCG Consulting.]