Telstra In Eye Of Storm

Newcastle Herald

Monday September 18, 2006

By ALICE KELLY

HUNTER Valley homes and businesses have been without a working telephone line for up to a week, after wet weather.

Elderslie resident Scott Seddon said yesterday his phone had been out since Tuesday and Telstra had refused to compensate him for calls on his mobile phone.

A Telstra spokesman said yesterday recent rain affected about 100 metres of cable and staff were working nights to replace it.

Another Elderslie resident, who did not want to be named, said his phone had not worked since Saturday night, September 9.

This was despite repeatedly being told by Telstra staff during the week that the problem would be fixed by the next day.

One mobile phone call to Telstra to lodge the complaint had cost about $10, he said.

"They said it would be ready by Tuesday, then Wednesday, then Thursday, but it hasn't been," he said.

Mr Seddon said Telstra complaint service operators had told him that about 90 customers were affected during the several phone calls he made to rectify the problem.

Mr Seddon's phone was working within an hour of The Herald contacting Telstra yesterday.

The Telstra spokesman said staff would work overnight and phones were being progressively fixed, but it was a large job.

He apologised to customers for the inconvenience and said Telstra would be investigating the claims customers were not being compensated for mobile calls.

"I will be speaking to [Telstra] Country Wide to make sure that they get involved," the spokesman said.

He could not say yesterday how many customers were affected.

Mr Seddon questioned whether Telstra had enough technicians with local knowledge to fix problems in a reasonable time.

The Herald reported in July that Telstra would sack 222 field technicians across Australia, including 60 in the Hunter, to stay competitive.

"Telstra no longer has the resources to respond to a problem in their own network," Mr Seddon said.

"That is what worries me."

But the spokesman denied the delays were due to too few technicians, saying replacing the cable was a big job.

© 2006 Newcastle Herald

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