ACMA’s standards for consumer redress align with the ACCC’s more stringent standards on broadband speed claims
Telstra was fined for failing to meet continuity and quality of services standards related to network migration
On 29 January 2025, the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) announced it had fined Telstra over quality of service issues experienced by customers during its legacy network migrations. According to an investigation conducted by the regulator, the operator had failed to complete required speed testing for consumers migrating to National Broadband Network (NBN) based connections. Given these failures, Telstra was found to have violated a number of consumer protection obligations set out in the NBN Service Migration Determination 2018 and fined A$394,380 (£197,313) as a result. In announcing the fine, Nerida O’Loughlin (Chair, ACMA) criticised how “too often we see [operators’] internal systems and processes being blamed for bad consumer outcomes”, and urged operators to ensure sufficient investment in those internal systems.
The operator failed to conduct speed testing for new connections and delayed refunds due to consumers for on slower speeds
According to ACMA’s investigation report, Telstra had notified the regulator in November 2023 that three issues with its internal business systems had impacted the operator’s compliance with obligations related to network migration. Specifically, Telstra described that issues with customer data management and refund processing systems had resulted in the failure to conduct maximum attainable speed (MAS) testing for customers that had recently migrated to an NBN-based connection and had delayed required refunds to some consumers. Under the 2018 determination, Telstra is required to conduct MAS testing within 20 working days of migrating a customer to an NBN connection that still relies in part on copper, such as an FTTC connection. In the event the maximum speeds measured from that testing do not match with the speeds guaranteed by the customer’s selected tariff, the operator must – within five working days – notify the customer and offer them the opportunity to move to a lower speed tariff or exit their contract at no cost. Additionally, Telstra is prohibited from charging customers for their new NBN-based service unless that service is tested and proven to meet the guaranteed speed or the customer fails to respond to notification on the option to adjust or exit their contract. In total, Telstra was found to have breached these obligations on 4,037 occasions between January 2022 and December 2023.
ACMA previously directed Telstra to comply with MAS testing and notification requirements in 2021
ACMA previously issued a remedial direction to Telstra in July 2021 regarding earlier failures to notify customers of MAS testing results of their new NBN connection and for charging those customers for that service without the proper notification of service issues. Between September 2018 and October 2020, Telstra was found to have breached its MAS testing and notification obligations in over 49,000 customer interactions. Discussing the fine issued to the operator for its more recent non-compliance, O’Loughlin emphasised that “these are some of the last services to be migrated across from the old copper network to the NBN, so there are no excuses for Telstra not to get it right”. In addition to conducting speed testing for partial copper connections, Australian operators are also expected to ensure consumers have continuity of service through network migration by maintaining old connections until an NBN service is confirmed to be functioning and by providing a replacement service or compensation if a new NBN service is not functioning within three days of migration. Though these requirements are specific to the context of network migration, more stringent standards for recourse when consumers don’t receive a service as advertised is broadly aligned with the country’s approach to broadband consumer protection, including the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s (ACCC) industry guidance on broadband speed claims.
