ISPs promise to do better on NBN migrations

NBN Co and its resellers have pledged to better work together to address some of the customer pain points with national broadband network migrations, from appointment no-shows to buck-passing with complaints.

An industry roundtable held by the Communications department yesterday and attended by the heads of NBN Co, Australia's four biggest telcos, and various industry bodies saw the key players in the NBN ecosystem commit to tackling the biggest migration issues for customers.

Complaints about contractors rescheduling or missing appointments, handballing of problems between NBN Co and internet service providers, and long lead times for connections have run rife since the start of the NBN build.

NBN Co is already working through a 'process improvement initiative' dubbed the 'focus on customer experience project', which the industry representatives yesterday said they supported.

The government said there was also support for "contractual changes" that would support "appointment-keeping, installation completions and complaint handling".

It did not provide further detail but said changes would be made collectively over the coming months to ensure NBN migrations "better cater to consumers’ needs". Progress will be reported to government within three months.

The government also yesterday released an updated migration assurance framework that targets a "positive experience with minimal or no disruption" for new NBN users.

It replaces - and largely mimics - the migration assurance policy that was released in February last year, with tweaks for the multi-technology mix environment. The framework outlines the roles and responsibilities for the various players in the migration process.

The federal government recently asked the Australian Communications and Media Authority to gather data from 21 businesses on how they resolve issues like fault handling, connection timeframes, and appointment keeping, among others.