Australia’s nbn to shut down satellite service at the end of the month

nbn

Australia’s nbn announced that its interim satellite service (ISS) will close down on February 28, and all residents and businesses using the service will need to switch to an alternative nbn network or be cut off.

There are currently over 1,000 premises connected to ISS across the country that have not taken any action to switch services. Nbn’s state corporate affairs manager Kylie Lindsay advised users that they won’t be automatically switched to a new service, so they need to act now.

“We have been working with our retail service providers for some time now to notify ISS users that they need to switch over to another nbn service,” Lindsay said. “This has included numerous phone calls, direct mail, door-knocking and advertisements in newspapers and online news sites. However, despite our best efforts to contact people, we anticipate there will be a number of people left without a service by the end of the month.”

Lindsay said that end users can switch to fixed or mobile broadband, just so long as they pick an option, contact their ISP and order the new service. A special ISS hotline has also been set up to deal with any migration issues.

Also: CVC discount model

Last week, nbn said it will be moving to a new discount model for its Connectivity Virtual Circuit (CVC) charge to encourage broadband services on the nbn network.

The new model, which comes into effect on 1 June, calculates the discount based on individual retailer averages, as opposed to an industry average. It automatically reduces the price of CVC as the average amount of CVC per end user increases.

Nbn chief customer officer John Simon said the change is intended to deliver “a number of benefits, including greater forward price certainty to retail service providers [RSPs], allowing them to better manage their cost base, and supporting growth in usage on the nbn network. It will also provide further scope for retailers to differentiate their offerings, which in turn will promote competition and assist consumers in accessing a wider choice of broadband plans.”

The new model is the next step in the evolution of the dimension based discount (DBD) pricing mechanism, which was introduced last June on an industry-average basis. It follows an extensive consultation period with RSPs.

“Our aim is to achieve better outcomes for end users, RSPs and nbn by providing a more direct link between an individual retailer’s dimensioning and unit price,” Simon said.

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