Consumer Justice: Telecommunications Services

From November 9th- 25th, 2024, the Oregon Values and Beliefs Center (OVBC) conducted a statewide survey of Oregonians’ values and beliefs regarding consumer justice.  The research was conducted to assist Oregon Consumer Justice (OCJ) in their commitment to advance consumer justice, shape an equitable and inclusive marketplace, and improve Oregonians’ rights as consumers through advocacy, legal support, community engagement, and consumer outreach.

The question numbers in this document correspond with the accompanying annotated questionnaire and tabs. Due to rounding, the percentages reported below may not add up to 100% or compare exactly to the percentages for the same question in the annotated questionnaire or tabs.

Included below for selected questions are noteworthy subgroup variations for age, gender, area of the state, BIPOC/white, etc. The accompanying set of tabs notes subgroup variations for all the questions.

Unless otherwise noted, each statement that summarizes noticeable differences captures a comparison within an identification category. For example, if reported that those 75 and older show a higher support of a particular statement, this captures a comparison to other age groups.

For survey full question wording, all statistically significant subgroup findings, and respondent quotes, readers are encouraged to refer to the accompanying documents located at the bottom of this post under “For More Information”: (1) annotated questionnaire, (2) crosstabulations, and (3) verbatim written responses spreadsheet (upon request).

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KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Cellular phone service is the most common telecommunication service that Oregonian currently have or have access to.
• Oregonians rate telecommunications service quality in relation to it’s pricing as slightly above average, and the majority of Oregonians say they don’t experience hidden fees or unexpected charges.
• The top three issues with telecommunications services in Oregon are: “increase in price for the same level of service,” “lower service quality than expected,” and “frequent service interruptions/outages.”

TELECOMMUNICATIONS ACCESS

Among telecommunications services, respondents most commonly report using a cellular phone service, with 94% indicating they currently have this service. The next most common service is broadband internet, with 50% of respondents confirming they have it. Interestingly, even mobile hotspot internet (19%) has surpassed landline phone service (18%), though the difference is within the margin of error. Available telecommunications services, even if not currently used, follow a similar pattern to current use. Cell phone service is the most commonly available, followed by broadband internet and landline, and mobile hotspot internet close behind.

TELECOMMUNICATIONS PRICING AND FEES

When asked to evaluate the balance of pricing and quality in telecommunications services, only 13% of Oregonians rated their services as “excellent,” while 6% rated them “very poor.” The largest proportion of respondents fell in the middle, with 38% selecting a neutral rating.

Hidden fees remain a frequent occurrence for Oregon Consumers. While 57% of Oregonians report not having experienced unexpected charges on their telecommunications bills, nearly one-third have encountered hidden fees either occasionally (23%) or frequently (8%).

A quarter of Oregonians (25%) report price increases for their telecommunications services without improvements in service quality as their top telecommunications issue of the past year. Other significant issues include lower service quality than expected (23%), frequent service interruptions (21%), poor customer service (18%), and misleading or inaccurate billing practices (14%). Around 37% of Oregonians, however, report not having experienced any of the issues presented in the survey.

The hidden and unexpected nature of these fees suggests that the number of people impacted is likely higher than reported, as individuals may be affected without realizing it.

When telecommunication service providers raise rates, the reasons behind the increases are often unclear to customers. 20% of respondents say they don’t understand the reasons at all, and another 28% only somewhat understand. Just 17% feel they fully understand, and another 28% said they haven’t experienced a bill increase in the past 12 months.

METHODOLOGY

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The online survey consisted of 1,763 Oregon residents ages 18+ and took approximately 10-15 minutes to complete. This is a sufficient sample size to assess Oregonians’ opinions and review findings by multiple subgroups. Respondents were contacted by using professionally maintained online panels. A variety of quality control measures were employed to gather responses, including questionnaire pre-testing, validation, and real-time monitoring of responses. To ensure a representative sample, demographic quotas were set, and data was weighted by area of the state, gender, age, and education.

OVBC surveys currently use aggregated data to analyze the opinions of BIPOC residents in comparison to the opinions of residents who identify as white and not another race. BIPOC residents are not a homogeneous population, instead, they represent a wide diversity of races and ethnicities. The findings included in this memo should not be construed such that all people of color are believed to share the same opinions. Disaggregated race data will be provided when sample sizes permit reliability.

Statement of Limitations:: Any sampling of opinions or attitudes is subject to a margin of error. The margin of error is a standard statistical calculation that represents differences between the sample and total population at a confidence interval, or probability, calculated to be 95%. This means that there is a 95% probability that the sample taken for this study would fall within the stated margin of error if compared with the results achieved from surveying the entire population. This survey’s margin of error for the full sample is ±2.33% 

For More Information:

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

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