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Satisfaction with UK, On-Train WiFi Connections Improving, but Much Still to be Done – say Surveys

(25 Feb 2019, BWCS Staff)

Two recently released surveys of train passengers underline there is much work still to be done to improve trackside connectivity along the UK rail network. According to the Transport Focus’ National Rail Passengers Survey (NPRS), 52% of the 10,935 respondents said they were “dissatisfied” with the on-board internet connection on UK trains. However, it should be noted that this number has consecutively improved over each of the last two sample periods – Spring 2018 and Autumn 2017.

Meanwhile, according to an Opinium survey of 1,001 travellers, a staggering 86% of UK train passengers say they have struggled to connect to mobile data networks whilst on board British trains. The second report, which was commissioned by USwitch and carried out in December 2018, seems to lend weight to the arguments for better mobile or trackside coverage alongside the UK rail network.

The latest analysis, using a much smaller sample, paints a worse picture than that offered by Transport Focus which consults 50,000 passengers a year to produce the National Rail Passenger Survey. According to figures from BWCS’ online database www.Internet4Trains.com 65.4% of UK train carriages offered WiFi connectivity by the end of 2018, placing the country 7th in the list of WiFi on Trains by penetration in Europe.   

The Transport Focus study noted that the biggest improvements in train passenger satisfaction were with the reliability of internet connection which had gone up 4%, as had the satisfaction levels with availability of power sockets – the other significant improvement.  

According to the USwitch survey, some 66% of those who experienced on-board connectivity issues said they were unable to connect to WiFi, while 56% were unable to hook up to mobile networks on 3G or 4G. 54% of those surveyed said they had experienced calls dropping out, while 43% said they had been unable to make phone calls at certain points. 38% said they had been unable to send or receive SMS messages.

The report threw up some interesting stats about how passengers are using their devices, with only 5% of passengers surveyed saying they had never used a smart-phones. 47% said they used their handhelds to access social media, while 39% had also listened to the music or the radio, 35% used it for personal correspondence, 31% for reading, 22% for shopping, 20% for catching up on work, 13% for watching TV or movies and so forth.

There was little detail on the routes actually used in the USwitch survey. However, it reported that travellers on rail lines in Scotland and northern England are more likely to complain about patchy mobile data reception, with nearly nine in 10 (87%) encountering issues across all forms of transport, whereas those in the Midlands are least likely to do so – although it still affects three quarters of commuters (77%).

The Government has previously stated that it plans to make “uninterrupted” WiFi and Mobile (5G) broadband speeds of up to 1Gbps (Gigabits per second) available on-board all UK mainline train routes by 2025, though the jury is still out on whether this will be delivered.

BWCS is constantly monitoring developments in the WiFi on Trains sector within each national market. For more information about how to access our international database of interviews and market developments (www.Internet4trains.com ), please contact Ross.Parsons@BWCS.com  

On-board WiFi, trackside networks, the growing market for passenger WiFi services and on-board entertainment will be the main subjects of BWCS’s WiFi on Trains Conference 2019 on the 4th and 5th of June.

For more information on the conference please see www.Traincomms2019.com or contact Ross.Parsons@BWCS.com .

The 2019 conference (www.Traincomms2019.com ) is sponsored by Icomera, Nomad Digital, Fluidmesh, RADWIN and BAI Communications.

 



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