The NBN was supposed to mean faster internet but one Towradgi family thinks it’s made things worse.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
And they’re convinced they're far from the only ones.
“Every parent in that room who lives in North Wollongong said they’re having issues with the internet dropping out since they’ve gone onto the NBN.”
Cate McFarlane said she had Telstra connect her Towradgi Road home to the NBN three months ago.
Since then, she said they have been plagued by internet dropouts – sometimes for as long as a day.
“We’ll get the internet come in for a few hours a day and then it will drop out,” Ms McFarlane said.
“We’ve had two technicians come out and neither of them know what’s wrong. We had one technician say it might be our house. I told him we had no problem with the old internet.
“And when we do have the internet it’s slower than it’s always been.”
Having limited internet access is about more than not being able to check Facebook or download a movie.
Ms McFarlane said she needed to be online for work and her daughter had to complete school homework while on the internet.
“You have to be there typing information into the computer. I can be doing that for an hour and, if the internet drops out, I lose all that information.”
When her daughter goes online to complete her homework, she said they have to “struggle through” and hope the internet didn’t drop out.
And she said she was convinced she was not the only person in the area having NBN issues.
“We went to a parent-teacher night the other night,” Ms McFarlane said.
“Our daughter has to do this online education because she’s in primary school. We said ‘our internet drops out all the time and we’re not quite sure if she’d be able to do it’.
“Every parent in that room who lives in North Wollongong said they’re having issues with the internet dropping out since they’ve gone onto the NBN.”
Ms McFarlane said she was not happy that Telstra continued to bill her for the internet and had logged the issue with the Telecommunications Ombudsman.
A spokeswoman from NBN said an issue had been reported on January 12.
“The cause was a faulty phone socket inside the home and was repaired within five days of being notified by her provider which restored the service,” she said.
She said matter would now be with Telstra, who may be conducting line testing.
The spokeswoman recommended people contact their provider in the first instance.
A Telstra spokeswoman said they were aware of the issues around Ms McFarlane’s NBN service and apologised for the inconvenience.
“We are in contact with Ms McFarlane and are working with NBN Co to resolve the issue as quickly as possible,” she said.