When the National Broadband Network (NBN) arrived in my area in late 2016, residents were greeted with a barrage of junk mail advertisements from all manner of internet service providers offering competitively priced internet at fast speeds.
At the time, I was under contract with Telstra, so I did not consider moving from Bigpond cable to the NBN. And thank goodness I didn’t. Since the NBN arrived, I have heard numerous horror stories from neighbours, acquaintances and friends who have suffered from connection problems with the NBN, dropouts, painfully slow speeds, and even some cases of households being stranded without internet access for weeks on end.
It got so bad that Telstra told me to stick with its existing service until the NBN’s problems are fixed. That was around six months ago, and I am still waiting.
The horror stories relating to the NBN are obviously wide-spread, given complaints relating to the NBN have jumped 200% according to the Ombudsman’s latest six monthly report.
And a new survey has revealed that one-third of NBN users wish it had never arrived because their original service was better. From The Australian:
A survey of 958 Australians on the NBN found 34 per cent would revert to their pre-NBN service if they had the option, with the leading reason being their previous connection was faster or more reliable.
Other reasons cited were the previous service was better value overall, or cheaper.
The research, conducted by finder.com.au found, Victorians were the most likely to want to switch back to a non-NBN connection with 40 per cent wanting to switch back, followed by New South Wales at 38 per cent and Queensland residents at 30 per cent.
The Australian reported last month more than 480 of NBN Co’s staff are on $200,000-plus salaries, and 120 earn more than $300,000, as complaints about the network surge…
Last year, Optus CEO Allen Lew warned that mobile technologies may advance to the point where many Australians will feel that they do not need to have home-based telecommunications access, like the NBN. According to Lew, around 25% of households already do not have the sort of fixed-line access that would allow them to use the NBN, and other consumers may be of the view that the NBN does not provide them with sufficiently improved service to justify the extra cost of using it.
One wonders whether the $50 billion NBN will ever live up to expectations, and whether it will end up becoming another expensive stranded asset that is superseded by a superior technology, such as mobile broadband.
