UK rural small businesses are being held back by lack of fast broadband says a new report by The Federation of Small Businesses (FSB). As a web design Kent company based in rural England we’re a bit limited on our broadband options. BT being the main option with a few others but they all have to use the same BT gear at the exchange so each offering is limited to the speed at the exchange. In a way we’re luckier than most as the exchange nearest to us was upgraded a few years ago so we have relatively good speeds of around 6mb.
Small web design companies like kc web design kent rely on fast internet connections to do there jobs. Most of the time its only uploading and downloading small web files but when it comes to things like off-site online backups or downloading large files (don’t get me started on why a BT business broadband home hub had a download cap of 5gb!) a 6mb connection just isn’t enough.
If small businesses are to thrive and prosper and contribute to a growing economy, they need universal access to what is now considered the fourth utility…
Faster broadband seems to be the norm in other countries, especially in large cities, but rural broadband is still being rolled out in some remote parts of the UK. With even just a small increase from 6mb to 20mb the difference it would make on what we can do here at kc web design kent would be huge. Online backups would take a fraction of the time. Downloading large files would be almost instant. Using Dropbox with large files would be a lot easier to manage. Our business would thrive.
So come on rural small businesses, lets hassle BT and get something done…
You can vote for better broadband with your local council. For any small web design kent businesses you can go to the KCC website here.
Or you can tell BT you want superfast fibre broadband.