For a company that specialises in telecommunications, Optus seems remarkably incapable of communicating with its own billing system.

When it comes to incompetence, Optus must surely be competing for a national title.

Australians already know about the company’s spectacular failures, from the catastrophic outages to the data breach and the Triple Zero disaster now linked to multiple deaths. But after this week’s performance, I discovered Optus also struggles with one of the more basic business concepts: taking money from willing customers.

This week I spent close to 45 minutes trying to give Optus my money. Not borrow it. Not negotiate it. Simply pay them.

The comedy began with a threatening email demanding I urgently update my debit card details or risk disruption to a business broadband service. Fair enough, I thought. Except the Optus website rejected the card. Multiple times.

No problem, technology fails occasionally. So I tried another debit card linked to an account containing more than enough money to satisfy even the most ambitious telco executive bonus structure. Rejected again.

At this point, Optus had achieved something remarkable: a telecommunications company unable to process a payment in 2026.

Naturally, I called customer service and was connected to an overseas call centre where the first challenge appeared to be locating my account, a process that consumed a solid 10 minutes and, I suspect, several pages of scripted troubleshooting prompts.

Then came the absurdity.

The operator emailed me instructions for “payment assistance” in case I was “having trouble paying.” Let me be clear: I wasn’t having trouble paying. Optus was having trouble accepting payment.

I was sitting there with a perfectly functional debit card, thousands of dollars in the account, and an overwhelming desire to settle the bill. Yet somehow I was treated like a financial hardship case because Optus’s own systems apparently couldn’t identify a valid card if it was stapled to the screen.

Then came four separate one-time security codes, multiple text messages, and another helpful SMS directing me back to the exact same webpage that had already rejected my card repeatedly.

At this stage even the operator appeared to realise the script had reached the end of its useful life. I was transferred to a “credit payment specialist” who, in what can only be described as a miracle of modern science, manually processed the exact same card within minutes.

The card wasn’t the problem. The system was.

And that’s really the story of Optus in a nutshell.

This is a company owned by Singapore telecommunications giant Singtel, yet it continues to lurch from controversy to controversy like a drunk bloke trying to find the exit at a pub.

First came the 2022 data breach exposing millions of Australians. Then the 2023 nationwide outage that crippled businesses, hospitals and transport systems. Then the unconscionable sales conduct findings. And now the Triple Zero failures linked to deaths and a devastating assessment of the company’s internal culture.

An independent review by Dr Kerry Schott found procedures ignored, processes not followed and described what can only be called a “culture of carelessness.” Optus accepted all 21 recommendations, promised reforms, promised accountability, promised improved risk management and promised to move more operations onshore.

Australians have heard plenty of promises from Optus.

What they haven’t seen is evidence the company can consistently get the basics right.

Because when a billion-dollar telecommunications giant cannot process a valid debit card online, but can manually process the exact same card moments later, it tells you everything you need to know about the state of the organisation.

Under CEO Stephen Rue, Optus says it is reforming. But right now the company still feels less like a modern telecommunications provider and more like a case study in how not to run critical national infrastructure.

And as I discovered this week, even trying to pay them can become an endurance event.