Myth busting - Fact vs Fiction: Will the real Karoo please stand up?

We know there are lots of myths out there about KC and Karoo – about the quality of our service, our prices and why there aren't other fixed line broadband providers in our area.

We think it's time to put the record straight and give people the facts...

Myth: Karoo download speeds aren't as fast as you get elsewhere in the UK

Karoo is one of the fastest broadband providers in the UK, with average download speeds for Karoo Lite, Mid and Pro of 10Mbps. That's 60% faster than the average UK broadband speed, which is 7.6Mbps according to Ofcom.

One of the reasons we're so much faster than the average is that 80% of KC customers live within 3km of an exchange, compared to 43% in the rest of the UK. The closer you are to an exchange the faster your broadband will be, so customers benefit from our exchanges being closer together.

Another reason we beat the UK average is that all of our exchanges are equipped with ADSL2+ technology, and some now even have KC Lightstream fibre optics.

Myth: KC won't let other companies use its network to provide fixed line broadband in Hull and East Yorkshire

We don't stop other providers using our network to provide broadband. We couldn't stop them even if we wanted to, because we're regulated by Ofcom.

Our network in Hull is completely open to competition. Proof of this is in the local business broadband market, where several other communications suppliers are using our network to provide their own services.

But in the same way that we can't stop other providers offering broadband services in Hull, we can't force them to either. We'd love to tell you why they're not offering services here but we don't know (you'd have to ask them that).

We do know it's nothing to do with us charging them over the odds to use our network though, because we don't. And it's not because our network uses different cabling to BT either (another popular myth), because it doesn't.

Myth: Karoo is more expensive than other broadband services

We offer Britain’s best value calling plans for the fourth year running. How do we do it? By packing in more free call features into our plans than you’ll find in any other home phone service, anywhere in the UK. We know Karoo isn't the

We know Karoo isn't the cheapest broadband service out there, but it's not the most expensive either.

What we're striving for is to be good value for money and we think our services offer that, with fast speeds, great reliability, free technical support and generous download allowances.

Myth: The Karoo service is unreliable and often down

Over the past year the Karoo service has been available for 99.96% of the time.

Like all broadband and call providers we experience occasional network issues, but just 0.04% downtime indicates that actually, problems are pretty rare and they don't last long.

While 100% uptime is our aim, we know we're already doing well compared to other providers

Myth: KC doesn't care about its customers

We want our customers to use our services because they want to, not because they're forced to.

Being the only fixed line broadband provider in this area doesn't make us complacent – instead, it means we have a responsibility to make sure Karoo is a really good service, and we take this responsibility very seriously.

That's why we invest heavily in our network, in product development, and in recruiting and training the right people to provide customer service and technical support.

The customer satisfaction surveys we do tell us that we already have lots of happy customers, but we know we can do more to make more customers happy. We'd like your help with this by telling us if you're having a problem with any aspect of our service. That way we can try to fix it.

Contact us on 01482 606101 or at help@kcom.com or Twitter @_kchome

Did you know?

Five things you might not know about Karoo

• You can check your broadband usage, access your Karoo webmail and change your anti-virus and anti-spam settings whenever you like on the Karoo Control Panel at https://controlpanel.karoo.kcom.com/CGIControl/control.pl
• At the Karoo MyTech centre on Carr Lane, members of Karoo's technical support team can configure your router, install anti-virus software on your PC and make your wireless broadband connection secure. You can find out more and book an appointment on 0800 915 5116
• Our Karoo Pro1 and Pro2 packages include FREE downloads between 12 midnight and 8am every day
• All calls to our technical support team are free of charge, and our call centre is based right here in Hull
• Why's it called Karoo? We get asked this a lot. When we launched Karoo back in 1996 we wanted a quirky name that didn't include the word 'Kingston' or Internet'. An employee had recently been to South Africa and travelled through a semi-desert area there called Karoo. He suggested the name and it got the thumbs-up from the team. During the 2010 World Cup in South Africa some Karoo customers gave us a big shout out on Facebook as they drove through the Karoo region!