A survey carried out on behalf of Commission for Communications Regulation shows that Irish people are now spending more time online than they are talking on the phone. 40% of all phone traffic is for internet usage, compared with 39% for telephone calls. This reflects increased internet usage by small businesses and residential consumers.
ComReg says there is a growing interest in internet services following recent developments including the introduction of flat-rate internet access products (FRIACO) and reductions in the price of DSL broadband connections.
ComReg's latest quarterly report shows that there have been 6,500 subscriptions for FRIACO products and 3,850 for DSL broadband connections between April and June.
The ComReg report shows that mobile penetration has now reached 81%, with 3.17 mobile subscribers. Internet penetration is 39%.
ComReg says Sky now has 286,000 subscribers, while 15% of cable television subscribers have gone digital. This means there are 370,000 digital subscribers.
The report also includes the findings of a survey into letter post services, which shows that households generally consider the service to be good.
But the survey finds that satisfaction has fallen across all service issues in the survey, while over half of businesses which have made a complaint in the past 12 months say their complaint has been handled badly.
There has also been an increase in the level of dissatisfaction with the amount of time An Post takes to deliver letters.
ComReeg recently granted An Post price increases but warned that it must address its inefficiencies.
