Virgin to trial higher broadband speeds

Virgin Media is to trial a speed increase on its mid-range broadband service.

13,000 customers in the Preston, Blackpool and Wigan areas on Virgin's 4Mbps 'L' service will have their downstream speed boosted to 10Mbps and their upstream speed boosted to 512Kbps from 384Kbps.

"We already have a premium broadband service offering download speeds of up to 20Mbps, but we’ll use this trial to listen to feedback from customers experiencing a significant speed increase on our middle tier of service," said Ernie Cormier, Virgin Media's managing director of group strategy and corporate development. "We want to ensure all of our broadband customers continue to get the best possible experience."

The trial will last several weeks.