• BBC News, Thursday, October 23, 2008 11 AM

Despite assurances of "unlimited" access, most broadband providers in the U.K. impose strict limits on how much bandwidth is provided any given customer each month. And a new study shows that a large percentage of those users are regularly using all or nearly all the access they have -- though they don't know it.

The penalty for going over one's allotted bandwidth is being cut off from Internet access all together, which could have serious implications for many who rely on access for daily activities-and the marketers who are paying to reach them. The survey found that 56% of broadband providers who advertised services as "unlimited" did impose usage caps, and that 80% of U.K. broadband customers either wrongly thought that they had an unlimited broadband package or did not know what their limit was.

"Broadband companies should not be allowed to class their packages as unlimited if they are not," said a spokesman for uSwitch, which conducted the survey. "As providers aren't choosing to be fully transparent about this issue people need to be savvy when choosing their broadband and pay close attention to the small print."

Read the whole story at BBC News »