ACA wavers on ISP performance guidelines - News - Communications

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This story was printed from ZDNet Australia.
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ACA wavers on ISP performance guidelines

By Andrew Colley, 0
April 15, 2002
URL: http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/communications/soa/ACA-wavers-on-ISP-performance-guidelines/0,130061791,120264598,00.htm

The Australian Communication Authority has released draft ISP guidelines for disclosing service information to potential customers, but is yet to finalise information that will be used to judge provider performance.

The guidelines, released by the ACA for public scrutiny today, are intended to provide consumers with a means to make informed choices when choosing an ISP. Currently the regulator is content with suggestions that consumers use ratios and averages to predict an ISP's performance.

To predict the performance characteristics of an ADSL and cable modem service provider, consumers will be given a ratio of off-peak delivery speeds to peak-hour delivery speeds. Similarly, dial-up providers would be required to provide customer-to-modem ratios and average peak bandwidth usage for the busiest hour of the day to indicate performance.

A low measure in either case indicates a higher likelihood of gaining access to the service, but at this stage the guidelines do not compel ISPs to use more explicit numerical measures. Notably broadband providers have no obligation to indicate the number of users accessing a node.

ACA spokesperson Alan Chalmers conceded that the indicators proposed at this stage favour giving consumers a measure of performance in term access rather than speed, but stressed that the guidelines were still in draft form.

"There's very much a need for wider comment about whether to use the expressions contained in the guideline, particularly on whether the performance measures are correct, because that was the area of the guideline where there was the least agreement," Chalmers said.

According to the ACA, the performance indication methods were chosen to account for performance variations across the course of a day. It also said that discussions with industry representatives revealed that consumers simply wouldn't understand "much of the technical information in relation to service performance".

The ACA is accepting public submissions on the guidelines until May 13, 2002. It is also holding public consultation meetings regarding the guidelines in capital cites throughout Australia over the coming month.