Mobile and internet satisfaction survey 2021

People's Choice winners

Skinny and 2degrees are the recipients of our People's Choice award for mobile services. 2degrees is our People’s Choice recipient for broadband. The award is given to providers that rate above average for customer satisfaction and meet our other performance criteria.

Internet provider ratings

Overall satisfaction

Customers experiencing internet service issues in the past two years

The most common problems reported by internet customers related to service performance (such as internet speed), availability, billing and customer service. Among those who contacted their telco about a problem, 54% said it took “a lot of effort” to deal with the company.

Internet satisfaction

Sixty-one percent of customers were happy with the service they were getting from their internet provider.

2degrees took top spot, scoring 72 percent for overall satisfaction.

It also rated above average for being easy to contact (67 percent) and the quality of its customer service (66 percent). Skinny also rated well on this measure (77 percent).

Vodafone stood out for all the wrong reasons.

Its internet customers were significantly more likely to experience problems: 66 percent reported running into issues over the past two years. That compares with the industry average of 56 percent.

Billing problems continue to dog the telco. One in five Vodafone customers reported a billing issue.

Customers were also significantly more likely to be dissatisfied with the support provided when they needed help: one in six were dissatisfied on this measure.

For overall satisfaction, Vodafone ranked last, scoring 56 percent.

Mobile provider ratings

Overall satisfaction

Customers experiencing mobile service issues in the past two years

The most common problems reported by mobile customers related to service availability, performance (such as speed), billing and customer service. Among those who contacted their telco about a problem, 60% said it took “a lot of effort” to deal with the company.

Mobile satisfaction

Overall, 63 percent of customers were very satisfied with the service they were getting from their mobile provider.

Two telcos topped the ratings: Skinny scored 75 percent and 2degrees scored 69 percent for overall satisfaction.

Skinny’s been an above-average performer for several years and continues to outrate Spark, its parent company.

This year, Skinny was the only telco to rate above average for satisfaction with pricing: 74 percent of customers with the pre-pay provider were happy with what they paid.

The company’s customers were also less likely to report issues with their mobile service.

Across the mobile market, 38 percent of customers had experienced a problem in the past two years. Service availability and performance were the most common issues.

Vodafone customers were again significantly more likely to report issues: 44 percent had run into problems in the past two years.

For overall satisfaction, Vodafone placed last: 58 percent of customers where very satisfied with the company’s service (the industry average is 63 percent).

Who’s who?

Spark and Vodafone are the biggest players in the telco market.

Spark, which also owns Skinny, holds an estimated 40 percent of the broadband market and 40 percent of the mobile market.

Vodafone has an estimated 21 percent share of broadband and 40 percent of mobile.

Vocus Communications is the third biggest player in broadband, with a 13 percent share. Vocus owns Orcon and Slingshot.

2degrees is best known as a mobile operator (holding a 19 percent market share). It also holds seven percent of the broadband market.

Other companies in our internet ratings table include MyRepublic and Trustpower.

MyRepublic set up shop in 2013 and is owned by Singapore-based MyRepublic Group.

Settling disputes

If you have an issue with a telco and haven’t been able to resolve it with the company, you can take your case to the Telecommunications Dispute Resolution service. The service is free for consumers.

About our survey

Our data are from a nationally representative survey of 2126 New Zealanders aged 18 years and over, which took place in June 2021. The survey was carried out in conjunction with the Commerce Commission as part of its “Consumer Telecommunications Survey 2021”, conducted by Research New Zealand.

• Companies are those with 30 responses or more (response numbers are in brackets). 
• Overall satisfaction shows the percentage of consumers who rated their internet/mobile retailer 8, 9 or 10 on a scale from 0 (very dissatisfied) to 10 (very satisfied).
• Where a respondent used a company for both internet and mobile services, they were only asked to rate the retailer once for overall satisfaction (rather than give separate ratings for mobile and internet). In reporting results for these respondents, it’s assumed satisfaction for each service was the same.