OTTAWA-GATINEAU – The CRTC has revised the results of its inaugural national study on broadband performance in Canada after determining that Bell's broadband speeds were not as fast as initially reported.
The Commission said Monday that the data published in its initial Broadband Measurement Report in September showed that Internet service providers (ISPs) largely met or exceeded their advertised download and upload speeds, and that this conclusion is still valid.
A CRTC spokesperson told Cartt.ca that the Commission was contacted on October 24, 2016 by “industry stakeholders” who noted possible discrepancies between the Bell DSL advertised speeds and those that were cited in the report. SamKnows, the company commissioned by the CRTC to conduct this study, determined that the wrong metrics were used to analyze the upload speeds of Bell Canada’s DSL Internet services.
As a result, Bell Canada’s broadband results were not as fast as initially reported. That company’s four DSL plans did not, in fact, meet their advertised upload rates, delivering an average of 85% of the advertised speed, said the CRTC. That same value was reported as 134% in the original study.
“The CRTC ranked ISPs’ performance based on their download speed and as such, the ranking provided on the CRTC website has not changed”, reads the emailed statement to Cartt.ca. “Going forward, SamKnows will review the data provided by individual ISPs to ensure that the speed tiers are those advertised and to ensure that this situation will not occur again. The Commission expects all parties that are partners in this project, including Canadian ISPs, are as forthright as possible in order to truthfully inform Canadians.”
A Bell spokesperson said in an emailed response to a question from Cartt.ca that it is looking at the new report and could not respond as yet.
The revised Broadband Measurement Report is available here.
