Call for urgent ACCC intervention to ‘stop Telstra stealing customers’ say competitors

Peter Dinham
Thursday, 05 March 2009 14:37

IT Industry - Strategy

There’s been a call for urgent action by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) to intervene in Telstra’s plans to reportedly forcibly disconnect competitors in a Canberra exchange.

The Competitive Carriers’ Coalition (CCC) claimed today that Telstra has given competitors 15 weeks notice that their customers’ services will be cut off, and it wants the ACCC to investigate if Telstra's plan breaches the Trade Practices Act and/or the operational separation rules.

In strident criticism of Telstra, who he described as being ‘completely disingenuous’, David Forman, executive director of the coalition, claimed that Telstra had offered competitors no alternative access arrangements, no alternative services and no compensation.

"These customers will have no choice but to go back to the Telstra network. In fact, it did not even bother to explain what was happening to the exchange.

"Telstra has since cynically claimed that the exchange was being demolished and that it had no choice but to cut off the service. If Telstra believes that this justifies its actions, it must believe that people are very stupid,” Forman said.

Forman said there were three simple questions that needed to be answered – “when did Telstra learn of this change?; how long did it spend planning how it would maintain its own retail services?; and, why did it treat other carriers and their customers so shabbily?”

He further claimed that if Telstra “is able to get away with this action in this exchange, then it is only a matter of time before it is repeated elsewhere. Imagine how differently Telstra would have acted if it was a wholesale only business that actually respected other carriers.”

Forman said it was clearly the time, now, for structural reform of the Australian telecoms industry.