ADAM Fardell can be a patient man, but three months after engaging telecommunications retailer Internode to connect his house to the National Broadband Network (NBN), the service is still not working.
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Internode’s promise of putting “your broadband in the fast lane for less than you think” has hit a major roadblock, and Adam’s patience is wearing thin.
“Since when is a company allowed to sell a service which won’t work?” he asks, grateful only for the fact that he refused to pay up front.
- Adam Fardell
Whilst the NBN rollout appears to be alive and kicking, accessing it does not appear to be a simple process. For Internode’s (and in fact, iiNet’s) clients in the hinterland behind Forster, their access to the NBN has remained in a hiatus, despite all hardware being installed.
There appears to be no end to the cycle of waiting in sight. Adam is just one client in the area who has faced dozens of conflicting reasons as to why their NBN connection has not been completed. After having spent seven years with them as an ADSL client, and over ten hours on the telephone trying to sort the NBN issue out, his previous relationship with Internode has dissolved into one of frustration.
Other disgruntled customers with iiNet and its subsidiaries (such as Internode and Westnet) are either still waiting, or have given up. Willina resident Gerry Locke signed up because of Internode’s pricing and positive online comments elsewhere around the country, but after no connection decided to go elsewhere. Pete Hawkins of Minimbah has also opted to change providers.
“They [iiNet] were good to deal with, but they just couldn’t get it to work. I think they jumped on the band wagon right at the start, and we were ready for them, but they weren’t ready for us,” he said, signing up with Telstra at the expense of paying more, after a month of frustration and endless phone calls with iiNet.
“We were hooked up within a week with Telstra, and have had absolutely no trouble.”
According to a spokesperson for NBN Co, there is nothing preventing a retailer connecting to the NBN network, which retailers do on an individual basis be it for a home or a business, just as they would for a telephone line.
Whilst iiNet’s spokesperson initially said that the scenario described above was unlikely, they have since issued a statement apologizing to customers involved.
“Unfortunately, due to a systems issue, we opened up Wireless NBN to customers [in the region] before it was available,” said NBN product manager Rachael McIntyre, offering a full refund for any hardware purchase or rental.
After marketing their NBN packages to residents when the NBN was rolled out in the area, iiNet belatedly realised that unlike urban areas, they did not yet have their own physical fibre connected to the region’s network. They have subsequently contracted, and are waiting for, a third party to build it.
“We’re excited about the NBN, and its potential to transform regional communities like Forster. We have learned from this very unfortunate error, and we have put in procedures to ensure this does not happen again for future roll out areas.”
In the meantime, Internode’s opening line for their NBN promotion, ‘You know all that time you spent waiting for the NBN?’ has taken on a whole new meaning.