Telecom customers unhappy

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Telecom's Xtra internet customers are angrier than ever, with a Consumers' Institute survey rating it the least popular internet service provider (ISP) for the third year in a row.
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The results come after a string of Xtra outages, the latest of which happened on Sunday morning, reducing emergency services to pens and paper.

The Consumers' Institute survey found only 42 per cent of Xtra subscribers rated its performance "good" or "very good". That was down on 55 per cent last year and 78 per cent in 2005.

In both 2005 and 2006, Xtra rated worst of the ISPs.

Consumers' Institute chief executive Sue Chetwin said approval ratings dropped further to 36 per cent after Xtra's merger with Yahoo wreaked havoc with its new "bubble" email service in August.

A quarter of those surveyed rated Xtra's performance as poor or very poor – by far the greatest level of dissatisfaction with any ISP in New Zealand.

Chetwin said that while Telecom had repeatedly mentioned improving services for broadband users, the promises had not translated into reality for most consumers.

"Broadband users have been promised so much in terms of faster speeds, larger data caps, and cheaper pricing, but our survey shows that most customers think they're getting a rough deal. And compared with overseas, there's no doubt they are."

Telecommunications Users Association chief executive Ernie Newman said customers were increasingly savvy about IT requirements and expected more from their ISP.

A lot of people were starting to question the basic technical competency of the Xtra platform.

"I think it's time that the public started hearing from the engineers and people who can give an explanation about what's going wrong here, rather than just from the PR department.

"Telecom have got to get out of the mindset of treating New Zealanders as technologically impaired."

Telecom retail spokesman Nick Brown said the company was "disappointed" with the survey.

The "bubble" email upgrade had "obviously" had an impact on the results, he said.

The recently announced $1.4 billion investment plan into faster broadband would address technology platform concerns.

That investment had been "well received" and would "provide the platform for ISPs to bring improved broadband to customers".

Telecom would review the survey results as part of its "ongoing work to improve services for customers".

Sunday's outage affected broadband services and some paging systems and databases. South Island police and fire communication centres switched to manual backup systems during the breakdown.

Newman said the breakdown was another example of Telecom's technical equipment falling over.

"If a phone company in 2007 can't run a reliable ISP that doesn't go off the air with extreme regularity, then there's something fundamentally wrong."

Meanwhile, Telecom faces a major milestone tomorrow, as the Commerce Commission is due to announce charging details for competitors' access to the unbundled network.

- © Fairfax NZ News