According to a new report out of the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman, complaints against telcos by both consumers and businesses are on the rise.
Residential consumers and small businesses made 65,970 complaints over landline, mobile or internet services between the 1st July and 31st of December 2016.
The organization’s Six Monthly Update found that complaints about customer service, billing and payments, faults and complaint handling were the most common, with Victoria and South Australia contributing the most complaints proportionally.
The TIO also found there was a a 6.8% increase in complaints about services delivered over the national broadband network compared to the preceding six months.
However, they also noted that the rate of increase in these complaints was slower than the rate of new premises connected to the national broadband network.
All in all, complaints were made against 324 phone and internet providers in Australia.
TIO spokesperson Judi Jones says “the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman has experienced an increase in complaints for phone and internet services, which were up 5.3% from the preceding six months (1 January 2016 to 30 June 2016). This is a 33.8% increase in complaints compared to the same six months in 2015 (1 July 2015 to 31 December 2015).”
