Hundreds of emergency calls failed and thousands of customers have sought compensation from Optus following the telco’s nationwide outage, a senate inquiry has heard.
Optus CEO Kelly Bayer Rosmarin was grilled by Senators on Friday about the the telecommunication giant’s 14-hour blackout which impacted about 10 million customers last week.
The outage wreaked havoc for both small and large-scale businesses owners which were forced to adjust their operations as phone lines and EFTPOS terminals went down.
Ms Rosmarin said 8,500 customers have reached out to Optus to seek compensation since the outage, with the telco so far racking up a compensation bill of $430,ooo.
About $36,000 of that amount has already paid out to customers and small businesses.
Asked whether the compensation to customers has been in cash terms or in-kind services, Ms Rosmarin said she would take the question on notice to “double check”.
Senate Inquiry Chair Sarah Hanson-Young told the Optus chief it was an “important point to clarify”.
Ms Rosmarin said not all payment terminals for business owners were impacted during the nationwide outage.
“Some of the payments were working actually, it’s only about 50 per cent as I understand of payment terminals that weren’t working or didn’t have the right back up,” she said.
Optus Managing Network Director Lambo Kanagaratnam said the payment terminals impacted during the blackout were those which solely relied on the Optus mobile network.
That means if the payment terminal, or EFTPOS machine, did not have the ability of alternate connectivity or to switch to another mobile provider, it likely went down during the outage.
Ms Rosmarin could not confirm how many small businesses were impacted in terms of not being able to accept payment from customers, but would take the question on notice.
The Optus CEO said the company was working closely with the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman to ensure all complaints were addressed in a “timely and efficient manner”.
From November 13, eligible customers and small business owners were offered 200GB of free data as compensation for the outage.
Faster internet speeds for NBN and home broadband customers have also been offered for the month of December.
During the Senate inquiry, Ms Rosmarin revealed 228 triple-0 calls could not go through during the network blackout last week.
She highlighted not all Optus customers were unable to call the emergency number, as the experience differed from person to person depending on the device they were using.
“Most Optus customers were able to access triple-0,” she told senators.
Ms Rosmarin said Optus conducted welfare checks on those 228 customers when its network resumed, noting all people were “okay”.
She was pressed by Senator Hanson-Young on whether Optus should “cop a penalty” for failing to provide customers with the critical service of being able to call triple-0.
“We absolutely believe that the triple zero system should have worked and it’s critical for all Australians that the system can be relied upon,” Ms Rosmarin replied.
“We don’t manage the triple zero system. It’s a very complex system that involves all the carriers. It involves the device manufacturers and it involved the triple-0 operators.”
Ms Rosmarin said the Australian Communications and Media Authority was assisting in the investigation to find out why some Optus customers were unable to reach triple-0.
“We’re still investigating that and we’re really happy that the ACMA has called an investigation into why this did not work,” she added.
