A LEITCHVILLE eatery was forced to turn away customers recently after a fault at the town’s Telstra tower caused dozens of failed transactions.
Townspeople said it took about eight phone calls and hours of wasted time for telco giant, Telstra to repair a fault at the tower, located at the Leitchville recreation reserve.
Long-time resident, Doug Hawken first contacted the communication provider about the “dreadfully” slow Wi-Fi internet speed in late December.
“The first thing I did was ring up and say, ‘there is something wrong with the tower’,” Mr Hawken said.
“I told them that there is nothing wrong with my wireless modem, I had full bars on my computer, so they proceeded to pass me onto a technician, who actually never did anything, and they disappeared and said they would ring back.”
Mr Hawken, who has been a loyal Telstra customer for more than 20 years, said it took a third phone call at the eighth week before help was reached from within Australia, not a foreign country.
“I tried to complete internet banking, but it took me 15 minutes to open Google so I could access my account and do a transaction. By that stage I had enough,” he said.
Mr Hawken said the internet speed in Leitchville has been “perfect” since February 4.
“My argument is, why it took that long to fix a problem that could have been fixed within just a matter of hours,” he said.
“It is negligent on their behalf. I pay $109.95 for 15 megabits, and was only receiving about $25 worth of service. I have requested at least one month worth of compensation of free internet.”
Mr Hawken has sent a letter to Telstra for an explanation on its failed communication and a reasoning behind the fault.
“Red Gum Bakery here in Leitchville has 1.2 metres worth of failed transaction receipts; it’s just not good enough,” he said.
“Rural communities rely heavily on businesses, coupled with an aging population, we rely on our internet connection to do the simple things that are convenient when he can’t, and ultimately don’t need to, travel out of town.”
Red Gum Bakery owner, Christine Macdermid said visitors stopping at the popular overnight recreational vehicle site were forced to either scrape together loose change in their cars or withdraw money from the adjoining transaction centre, only if they were Bendigo Bank customers.
“We weren’t even able to pay staff wages and bills. A lot of people carry plastic around with them,” Mrs Macdermid said.
“Some customers were able to scramble for coins, while we had to put cakes back in other cases.
“We felt that Telstra saw us as a small population, so it wasn’t seen as a priority for them.”
Telstra area general manager, Steve Tinker said the tower was upgraded to 4GX, which is progressively rolling out across regional and rural communities, last year
“Following the upgrade it became apparent some antenna equipment used was faulty,” Mr Tinker said.
“The fault was complex and required work with the supplier to first determine the exact nature of the fault and how best to fix it.”
He said the fault didn’t become apparent until after the equipment had been installed, and “working for some time”.
“We have now fixed the problem and the mobile base station is functioning as it should,” Mr Tinker said.
We are sorry for the inconvenience this has caused customers, and encourage anybody who may be continuing to have problems to please contact us to report this.”
