Best services — broadband, insurance and subscriptions compared

Services are the category where the advertised figure and the contractual figure are almost never the same number. A broadband package advertised at a headline speed is sold with a guaranteed minimum buried in the contract, and only that second number carries any obligation.

So we read contracts rather than landing pages. For broadband: the guaranteed minimum speed, the upload figure, the length of the commitment, and what the price becomes when the promotional period ends — frequently within twelve months. For banking: the total annual cost including account fees, card fees, ATM and currency conversion charges, and the conditions under which a fee-free account stops being fee-free. For insurance: the exclusions, the excess, and what the sum insured actually covers.

The second component is what happens when something goes wrong. Published complaint-handling times, whether support is reachable outside the automated menu, and whether the provider is bound by an alternative dispute resolution scheme. In a service, that is the equivalent of build quality in a product.

Everything is scored on total cost over the full contract term, never on the monthly figure in the advertisement.