A survey of ISP customer satifaction has revealed the big boys have a lot of work to do to improve their reputaions with customers.

None of the three biggest providers - BT, NTL and AOL - managed to satify more than a third of their customers, according to Which?.

Small outfit Zen Internet got top ratings for ease of set-up, customer service, online and phone support, speed and reliability, with 77 per cent of customers saying they were satisfied overall.

Waitrose's broadband did well too, winning a "Best Buy" award for the second year running. It satisfied almost three quarters of its customers, including by offering a free helpline. Global rounded out the top three, coming neck and neck with Waitrose on 72 per cent.

The new breed of "free" broadband from the like of Carphone Warehouse and Orange fared badly, hovering around the one third satisfaction level with punters finding poor support and reliability can be the cost of getting something for nothing.®

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