UK : T-Mobile’s mobile broadband network has been judged the best in the UK for the second successive quarter in independent tests carried out by leading test house P3 Solutions. The tests, released today, benchmark T-Mobile against its competitors by measuring customer experiences that matter most to users during peak usage hours across 16 cities throughout the UK. When measured against its mobile broadband competitors, T-Mobile was found to be fastest by a considerable margin for web browsing, internet upload speeds as well as for sending and receiving emails.
The tests show that in Q4, T-Mobile had the fastest web-browsing experience that on average was 35% faster than the nearest competitor. T-Mobile’s top ranking in the P3 Solutions quarterly analysis is supported by a superior upload performance that is 59% quicker than the next best operator. With the popularity of social networking sites continuing to grow, T-Mobile customers who upload photos to Facebook or videos to YouTube will benefit from the fastest overall upload speeds across cities tested in the UK. T-Mobile’s Mobile Broadband service is also the best for sending and receiving e-mails with attachments, being fives times faster than all other operators for sending e-mails and twice as fast for e-mail reception.
T-Mobile began independent network benchmarking in Q2 2008 in order to establish a framework for conducting ongoing improvements to the mobile broadband customer experience. Network performance is measured against everyday applications such as browsing the most visited web sites; streaming video; downloading a 3MB music file; uploading a 1MB file and email performance with a 500KB attachment.
To replicate actual usage patterns, all measurements are performed not earlier than 11am and not later than 11pm, seven days a week. This customer-centric methodology enables the identification of real issues on which T-Mobile can act to improve the user experience. Since testing began, T-Mobile has achieved a 12% improvement in web browsing reliability and download speeds have increased by more than 40%.
Emin Gurdenli, Chief Technology Officer, T-Mobile UK, commented: “To be ranked No1 for two consecutive quarters since testing began in April last year is a significant achievement. Our consistently high performance is testament to the fact that we continually test and improve our network to make sure our customers are getting the best possible mobile broadband experience. As the number of customers opting for the flexibility and convenience of mobile broadband continues to rise quarter on quarter, we will continue to expand on the potential of mobile broadband, through improved performance and our innovative range of tariffs and laptop bundles.”
T-Mobile was the first operator to roll out HSUPA on a nationwide basis and is in the process of upgrading the underlying download capability of its HSDPA-enabled 3G network to 7.2Mbps both within the M25 and other major cities, providing realistic mobile broadband speeds of up to 4.5Mbps in those enabled areas.
In addition to the third-party benchmarking commissioned by T-Mobile, independent reviews underscore the performance of T-Mobile’s mobile broadband network. At the 2008 Mobile Data Association Awards, T-Mobile was awarded the title of Best Network, and a YouGov survey published in November 2008 comparing all the major mobile operators revealed that T-Mobile was best for network coverage, download speeds and customer service.
Richard Warmsley, Head of Beyond Voice services, commented: “As well as giving users a great experience, we also understand how our customers want to access the internet on the move. For example, we’re the only operator not to automatically penalise customers if they exceed their data fair use policy and we prefer to talk honestly about the speeds customers can expect to receive, rather than quote unrealistic maximum possible speeds.”
T-Mobile offers the most comprehensive mobile broadband coverage checker which uses a substantial data model to determine where a customer is most likely to get a true broadband experience. Transparency of service extends to the simplicity of the tariff structure expressed in easy to understand day, weekly or monthly options, backed by a network measured for its performance using a quarterly regime of customer-centric tests.
