Getting more for what you pay

BROADBAND users in Malaysia have always wondered just what kind of service they are getting for the price they are paying. For a long time, many customers of broadband services in Malaysia had to pay a much higher price for the speeds they were getting.

It was great news for many that their speeds will be increased by almost ten-fold at no extra cost after the middle of August with Telekom Malaysia Bhd (TM) bumping up speeds to match what most countries are giving.

In fact, for the price point consumers are paying and the speeds they are getting, the service they are getting is way better than what many in other countries are getting.

The only question is whether this could have been done earlier.

With TM giving such an increase in Internet speeds to consumers, it is apparent that it could have been done earlier. By increasing speeds to such an extent, it means that TM had the capacity to do so and one would think that it didn’t because it had pricing power and was able to price higher speeds for more money.

The action by TM puts pressure on other broadband providers to do so with the change in how packages are now being rolled out to consumers.

That, however, is still at odds with what the new government has promised, The deal was to double the speed at half the cost, But by giving ten times more speed. TM can argue it is giving more that what has been promised.

The focus now is on the other players. Maxis, which rides on the high-speed broadband network, has to correspond with its offerings and Time dotCom.Bhd will have to up its service to consumers to keep pace.