PTA QoS Survey Flags Major Issues with Fixed-Line Broadband Services

Most fixed-line broadband services in Pakistan are underperforming, according to the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority’s (PTA) latest Quality of Service (QoS) survey for Q2 2025. The authority reviewed 45 broadband operators across 22 cities and found widespread non-compliance with key performance indicators.

One of the key findings was that many operators exceeded the 80% threshold for bandwidth utilization. This suggests serious congestion issues during peak hours, which can lead to slower internet speeds for users.

Operators Missed Availability Targets

The survey measured availability benchmarks for both core and access nodes. While most met the standard of 99.9% uptime for core nodes, several did not, including:

• Air Communication
• Hajweri Network
• Khan Telecom (Lahore)
• Classic Broadband (Hajira)
• Ultra Link (Rahim Yar Khan)
• NTC (Hub)
• PSEB
• Leo Net
• Fiber Link (Karachi)
• Jawad Net (Layyah)

For access nodes, with a 99% uptime requirement, non-compliance was observed among additional providers such as Multinet (Sukkur), NTC (Quetta), PTCL (Havelian), and Nasttec (Mirpur).

High Jitter and Latency Affect Real-Time Services

The report also flagged excessive jitter—variation in latency—above the 15 msec benchmark. Operators falling short in this area included:

• PTCL (Peshawar)
• Global Expert (Abbottabad)
• S.B Communication (Rawlakot)
• Tulu-e-Subha (Lahore)
• One Click (Multan)

Network latency issues were also found. For local round-trip times (≤ 40 msec), S.B Communication and NTC (Hub) failed. International (terrestrial) RTT compliance (≤ 110 msec) was missed by NTC (Quetta), 5G Wifi Communication (Havelian), Way Link (Bhimber), and again, NTC (Hub).

The PTA has formally notified all underperforming service providers. The authority has shared detailed metrics to help them improve traffic management, infrastructure, and bandwidth allocation.