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The underperforming NBN is causing headaches for some of Australia's largest internet service providers (ISPs) who will have to compensate 11,000 customers for slow internet speeds.
TPG (the parent company of iiNet) and Internode are the latest ISPs to be caught out by the consumer regulator for misleading customers about their NBN speeds.
More than 8,000 iiNet customers and 3,000 Internode customers will be compensated for signing up to contracts that promised fast NBN speeds that could not be delivered by the ISP.
This latest slew of compensation brings the total number of Australians able to claim compensation for slow NBN speeds to around 70,000 people, including Telstra's 42,000, Optus' 8,700 and TPG's 8,000.
Around 7,620 of the customers were on fibre to the node (FTTN) connections and paying for iiNet's highest speed tier of 100Mbps download, 40Mbps upload. Of these, more than 1900 could not even achieve 50Mbps.
A third of Internode's affected customers were on FTTN connections and 100Mbps plans.
The two companies say they will give customers options including moving to a lower speed tier with a refund, or leaving their plan without charge and getting a refund.
Sarah Court, ACCC commissioner, says both iiNet and Internode admitted they likely engaged in misleading or deceptive conduct by promoting NBN plans with maximum speeds that were not deliverable.
"Internet service providers must provide accurate information to customers about the speeds they can access on the NBN," says Court.
"Many customers could not reach the maximum speeds advertised by iiNet and Internode because their connection was not capable of delivering it.
"Some customers couldn't even receive the maximum limit of lower speed plans."
Affected customers will be contacted by late April and informed of their maximum achievable speed and their options for compensation.
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Business News Australia
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