Telecommunications Advocacy: Insights from Australia

Elise DavidsonMedia & Communications, ACCANwww.accan.org.au

March 2012

2

Australian Telecommunications

•History of monopoly government-owned telecommunications infrastructure (1997 privatised)

•Three major telecommunications networks, but more than 1000 providers in total

•One company dominates fixed-line/mobile network

•Many older consumers have never considered switching providers

•Self-regulated industry – the industry writes the rules

•Industry trades on a marketing “confusopoly” – many people have problems understanding ads/plans and contracts and don’t know what they are signing up for

3

Findings of Consumer Research in Australia (Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman)

2011 Record complaint levels 200,000 telecommunications complaints a year(Compared with financial services: 21,000)

Main complaint issues:

•Billing and payments (51%)•customer service (42%)•faults (23%) •contracts (22%)•credit management (%)

4

National Broadband Network (NBN)

•Australia is a wide brown land = tyranny of distance (40 times the size of the UK)•30% of population live outside the capital cities (7 million people)•Government is building a telecommunications network for the 21st century costing $32 billion dollars = very controversial. We be rolled out over ten years to 2020•93% population will receive fibre optic cable to the premise•7% will receive wireless or satellite connections (mostly regional and rural areas)•Just last week, the competition regulator (ACCC) finally accepted Telstra (main telco’s plans to separate its wholesale network and retail businesses)•Government is paying Telstra $13 billion for its assets

5

Telco problems (TIO research)

•More than half of the consumers surveyed reported contact with their service providers five or more times before ringing the TIO.

•More than half of the consumers said they raised the matter with their service provider at least a month before contacting the TIO, with 31 per cent stating they had made a complaint more than three months beforehand

•60 percent of consumers reported spending three or more hours unsuccessfully trying to solve their complaint before approaching the TIO, with one in five saying they spent more than nine hours resolving their complaint

•ACCAN-Galaxy research found that only 7% of customers who had a problem in previous 12 months went to TIO – some 2.3 million people!

6

TIO Research (continued)

•Half of customers reported contact with more than three different departments to try to fix the problem

•The most common reasons for complaining to the TIO were because there was no solution offered by the service provider or a promise to resolve the complaint was not kept.

7

Case study: Vodafone•October 2010 –major outages no phone signal, very delayed text messages (SMS), limited/slow internet)

•Customers began complaining but Vodafone customer service denied there was a problem (VIDEO)

•Traditional and social media talk grew to fever pitch after Vodafail.com website was launched in December 2010 – 12,000 complaints in 3 weeks

•February 2011 – Vodafone Chief Executive issues a public apology to customers – still lost millions of $

•December 2011 – regulator finds Vodafone has breached the TCP Code in 5 ways, asks it to comply – no fines, no commercially significant sanctions

8

How ACCAN helps consumers•We advocate in three ways: behind the scenes negotiations, lobbying government/regulators, media

•Contacted Vodafone senior team, offered advice about customer service and complaint handling throughout (privately)

•Spoke to the media (provided case studies - public)

•Worked with Vodafail.com to amplify voices (internet)

•Used social media to tell consumers about their rights to contact the TIO (consumer education tip sheets) •Working with industry to improve TCP Code and amplifying consumer voices calling for change

9

What’s happening now?

•Two-year public inquiry called Reconnecting the Customer undertaken by the regulator (Australian Communications & Media Authority – ACMA)

•At end of inquiry, ACMA made 5 recommendations – industry was warned to make changes to its TCP Code or face mandatory regulation

•Telecommunications Consumer Protection (TCP) Code under review for 18 months, now lodged with ACMA

•ACMA is going through TCP Code to see if it is good enough – decision announced after April 2012

•Industry likely to face some sort of regulation

Elise Davidsonelise.davidson@accan.org.au

Twitter: @ACCAN_AU (work) @elisedavidson (personal)

Suite 402, Level 4 55 Mountain StUltimo NSW 2007Australia

+61 2 9288 4000www.accan.org.au