Customer debt and the Customer Service Guarantee

The Telecommunications (Customer Service Guarantee) Standard 2000 (No. 2) specifies timeframes for the connection of particular services, the repair of faults and the attendance at appointments by service providers. Customers may be entitled to compensation if these timeframes are not met. For further information about the Customer Service Guarantee (CSG), see the Australian Communication and Media Authority’s website: http://www.acma.gov.au/WEB/STANDARD/pc=PC_2017.

There are certain exceptions to the requirement for providers to connect or repair eligible services within standard specified timeframes. These exceptions include circumstances where a provider has reasonable grounds to believe that a customer would be unable or unwilling to pay either connection or usage charges by the due date. The relevant section of the CSG Standard is Part 3, Section 21 – Credit Standing of Customers.

As an example, standard CSG connection timeframes would not be likely to apply if a provider had based a decision not to connect or reconnect a telephone service on evidence which indicated that a customer appeared to be a credit risk, e.g. because they had a history of not paying their accounts. In these circumstances, the customer would not generally be entitled to compensation under the Customer Service Guarantee.

However, the TIO takes the view that a provider should reconnect a temporarily disconnected service within the timeframes specified in the CSG Standard after a customer pays outstanding charges. In such circumstances, the TIO would investigate complaints about connection delays to establish whether compensation under the CSG Standard was payable.

The TIO would be unlikely to investigate if a provider had permanently disconnected the service and had decided not to connect or reconnect the service.

Created: 17 March 2008
Updated: 30 April 2008