In an effort to cut down on misleading advertising in the future, internet service providers will likely have to give the average speed of their connections to consumers, it has been revealed.

Top 10 Broadband stated that it believes such an action will come into force in the next three years following Ofcom reports detailing how far short providers' speeds were of the maximum ones sold to consumers.

Marketing manager of Top 10 Broadband Jessica McArdle said that the disparity found between advertised and actual broadband speeds may be completely eradicated if protocol came to be the demonstration of average speeds only when advertising services.

She continued: "Consumers deserve to know what they're buying so they make an informed decision. We think it's inevitable that provision of average speeds by suppliers will be standard within the next few years."

Earlier this month, Ofcom revealed that Virgin was the top performer in terms of delivering the promised speed, with Tiscali bringing up the rear.

More than half of small businesses (53 per cent) believe that the most important benefit of outsourcing is guaranteed response times for IT support. London-based Connect conducted the research in 2007.