TechSee advertises itself as the world’s leading visual agentic AI platform. The company conducted a nationwide survey of 3,790 people that asked about real-world experiences and expectations around home WiFi performance. I think every ISP I know could have predicted the gist of the responses, but I think ISPs might be surprised at the percentage of people who are unhappy with WiFi.

The following are some of the most interesting responses to the survey:

• WiFi problems are rampant. 68% of households had a problem with WiFi in the past year. 18% of customers experience problems daily.
• Coverage issues within homes are a problem. 76% of respondents have problems with connectivity in some parts of their house.
• Getting help is a challenge. Over half of homes try to fix problems themselves, and 62% of them are able to make performance better. Two-thirds of homes have contacted their ISP about connectivity issues in the last year. 39% of those had a technician visit the home, and 20% of the technician visits did not fix the issue.
• Customers expect their ISP to be proactive. Three-fourths of respondents want the ISP to test WiFi coverage in every room as part of the installation. 56% are willing to spend extra for more equipment if they can see that it solves coverage gaps.
• Over half of homes have more than six devices connected to WiFi at any given time. The more devices connected, the higher the reported WiFi coverage problems.
• Nearly half of homes have a router that is over three years old, with only 29% upgrading in the last two years.
• Many ISPs market whole-home WiFi solutions. Surprisingly, customers of these packages have more problems than average.

What does all of this mean for ISPs? About one-third of customers are willing to pay extra for better WiFi performance, but if they pay extra, they expect coverage where they need it. The survey result that should concern ISPs is that nearly half of the people surveyed would switch ISPs to get better WiFi coverage and performance.

There is obviously a big gap between what ISPs promise for WiFi and what they deliver. Every ISP I know tells me that WiFi is their bane and the source of a majority of their customer complaints and unhappiness. Yet a lot of ISPs don’t have a truly premium WiFi service.

I’ve done a lot of customer surveys over the years, and I’m not sure that many ISPs fully grasp that many customers believe that WiFi is the direct signal from the ISP. Many customers use the term WiFi to refer to their broadband. This means they blame every WiFi quirk and weakness on the ISP.

I know a few ISPs that do this right. It’s not cheap to do it right, which means technician time with customers, but here is how the ISPs that do this well handle WiFi:

• They do the full house sweep at installation and recommend a solution to improve WiFi. That might mean a better location for the primary WiFi router or installing WiFi extenders. They don’t leave an installation until WiFi is maximized. It means being honest about the parts of the home with the strongest and weakest coverage.
• These ISPs help customers install new devices on the WiFi network if requested. This can be done remotely and lets them make sure the device is working right, and let a customer know if any problems are due to the device and not the WiFi network.
• Some ISPs monitor WiFi usage and will contact a customer if performance degrades.
• ISPs that charge a premium monthly WiFi fee are willing to visit customers to rebalance the network if the need arises.

Taking these steps can justify charging a significant monthly fee for premium or concierge service. Too many ISPs charge extra for nothing more than a one-time installation of WiFi extenders. Customers don’t view this as a premium service if WiFi still doesn’t work well.

This seems like an obvious service to offer if 68% of customers have WiFi problems. It’s particularly important if half of your customers are willing to change ISPs due to poor WiFi performance.