Reliability, not speed or value, is new mantra of British broadband users

According to Michael Phillips, product director of Broadbandchoices.co.uk which conducted the research, around 34 percent of 4000-odd respondents who took the survey, said that reliability was their main concern.

This is greater than both speed of connection (30 percent) and value (23 percent).

It comes as no real surprise as 47 percent of respondents believe their ISP has not lived up to its promises, with 70 percent of the disgruntled moaning about connection speed lies. Of those who lodged a complaint with their ISP over their broadband service, 55 percent said they felt it did not reach a successful resolution.

"Nine years after broadband was first introduced in the UK, it’s troubling to find that nearly half of broadband customers claim that the service isn’t living up to their expectations," Phillips said.

"The main reason for dissatisfaction is overwhelmingly because of broadband speed, demonstrating that ISPs are still falling short when it comes to meeting their customer's expectations after advertising unattainable headline speeds in the media," he said.

"The most disappointing findings from our research was how over half of respondents who had lodged a complaint with their ISP felt it did not reach a successful resolution," he added.

The findings follow research published by Ofcom, the telecoms regulator, in July, which confirmed that most providers achieve only half the advertised "up to" speeds for broadband connection. Ofcom, which carried out 60 million readings for its survey, found that the average broadband speed in the UK was 4.1 megabits per second (Mbps) for services claiming speeds of up to 8Mbps.

The UK is home to fifth largest online audience in the world after China, United States, Japan and Germany, according to a report released by ComScore earlier this year.