From debate to delivery: Rebuilding trust in the telco sector

Presenter: Cynthia Gebert, Ombudsman

Event: Comms Day Summit, Special Session: Restoring Telecom Reputation

Date and time: Monday 1 June 2026, 2.10pm

Duration: 20 minutes

Transcript: Check against delivery

Media enquiries: TIO Media Team on 0437 548 540 or mediaenquiries@tio.com.au 

I acknowledge the Traditional Owners of Country throughout Australia, and recognise their enduring connection to land, water, culture and community.

I pay my respects to Elders past and present, who carry the stories, knowledge and traditions of First Nations peoples, keeping communities connected through generations.

Long before our communications networks today, there were songlines written into the land and stories mapped in the constellations, as part of a rich and enduring system of connection and storytelling. 

That legacy continues today. Sovereignty has never been ceded. This always was, and always will be, Aboriginal land.

Good morning, everyone. 

When Grahame asked me to join this discussion, he gave the reasoning: “It’s because you’re an honest broker, Cynthia.”

I’ll be honest now and say it took me a minute or two to process that.

As an Ombudsman, you can’t get a higher compliment or more accurate take on the job description.

Early in my career, I learned that being independent doesn’t mean saying less. It means speaking frankly and fairly, even when it’s uncomfortable.

Back then, I made a conscious decision that an Ombudsman shouldn’t just be the last resort, or the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff. 

It should be, and must be, a voice for systemic change, using what we see in complaints to prevent harm before it occurs.

It’s why independent dispute resolution is such a critical part of the communications ecosystem. 

Because what we see at the TIO is the downstream effect of what’s going wrong in the sector, and this gives us a unique vantage point.

Not just to describe the problem, but also to understand where trust is being lost, and what it will take to rebuild in practice.

Too often, the sector gets caught up in adversarial conversations, testing the edges of obligations, debating compliance, and waiting for it to be written in black and white before acting.

However, the longer we wait for change to be prescribed, the harder it becomes to rebuild trust.

From a consumer’s perspective, that delay looks like a failure to act when it’s needed.

So, we need to ask ourselves today, are we ready to shift from debate to delivery, and from a compliance mindset to one of trust and fairness?

Towards an approach that puts people at the centre of the services we build and deliver. 

We know what it can look like in practice.

The introduction of the Financial Hardship Standard and the Domestic and Family and Sexual Violence Standard set clear expectations for telcos on the minimum safeguards for consumers needing support.

They create enforceable protections that drive more consistent provider behaviour and strengthen accountability. And critically for consumers, it means getting help doesn’t come down to luck.

These aren’t small changes. They go to the heart of how people experience our sector and our systems. 

These changes recognise connection is not a luxury. They’re about ensuring dignity, safety, and access. 

Working as intended, these standards result in support that is reliable, timely and appropriate when people need to stay connected during life’s harder moments. 

It is that consistency and accountability that builds trust - when you’re actively preventing harms before it happens.

But do we need to wait for the rules to be written to meet the corporate and social responsibilities required of us? 

We’ve repeatedly seen major reforms after failure, but by that point, trust is often already damaged.

The organisations that recover the fastest act early -before regulation is needed or beyond what’s required by the law.

When your business culture and systems demand that consumers and public outcomes are at the centre of what you deliver, you will get it right.

We can’t rebuild trust by only complying with minimum standards or waiting for the rules to be enforced.

Trust will be rebuilt by choosing to do what’s fair – before there’s failure and before anyone forces the choice on you.

The consumer experience

To see where the system is currently failing, let’s look at the experiences of people navigating it every day.

We all often hear that consumer expectations are rising, and that’s true. But that’s not happening in a vacuum.

As people rely more on their phone and internet to earn a living, access healthcare and to stay safe, their expectations rise in line with what’s at risk when those services fail.

But the tens of thousands of complaints we receive each year tell us trust isn’t being eroded just because providers get things wrong. Mistakes are inevitable in any industry. 

What matters to consumers is what happens after a mistake is made. 

And from what I can see, this is where reputation is being damaged - in delays, inconsistency and unclear communication. 

In commitments not being followed through and a lack of flexibility and compassion when it’s needed.

Trust can stay intact when things go wrong, if the fundamentals of a good relationship are in place:

• Reliability, that it works when it matters, and when it doesn’t you follow through.
• Honesty, no hidden costs, no fine print surprises, and not selling people products or services you know they can’t afford.
• And respect, people want to feel heard, valued, and dealt with fairly. 

It sounds simple enough, doesn’t it? 

But the reason we’re here is because of a gap between that expectation and the lived experiences of your customers.

We heard from Simon, who accidentally paid his telco bill twice, and contacted his provider for a refund. 

A refund was sent via cheque, but to the wrong address.

To issue the refund again, Simon was asked to drive to the nearest store and show identification. 

Simon’s nearest store was a two-hour drive away. 

Out of curiosity, how many of you allow your customers to pay by cheque for their services? 

And then we have Jenna*, who contacted her telco after an accident left her in financial hardship.

She was told she would receive discounted services while she recovered.

But the following month, the full amount was still charged. When she called back, she was told the discount did not exist and was warned she would be disconnected due to underpayment.

And Kon, whose services were disconnected because a debt was incorrectly listed on his account.

He received written confirmation that the debt was an error and that the system had been updated.

Kon later discovered the debt was still on the account and was concerned about facing another disconnection. 

Before coming to the TIO, Kon told us he’d spent over 100 hours on the phone trying to resolve the matter directly with his telco.

These are not isolated cases.

We continue to hear from your customers who are doing the right thing – asking early, explaining their situation – and still not getting appropriate customer service.

And too often, we hear how an unresolved telco problem, or a series of avoidable errors and poor communication, make an already difficult situation worse.

We’re also seeing the entrenching of positions, not just from consumers but also from telco providers. 

And the longer a dispute takes, the harder it becomes to resolve. 

Trust erodes further. 

And expectations shift from wanting resolution to seeking escalation.

And it’s your customers who bear the consequences of delay, stress, financial loss, and disruption. 

Are we asking the right questions?

At the TIO we hold ourselves to those same standards of reliability, honesty and respect when dealing with consumers. But we recognise we don’t always get it right either. 

Over the past 12 months, we haven’t consistently delivered the reliability consumers need from us.

People coming back to us, after trying and failing to resolve an issue with their provider, and they are waiting too long for case management.

Delays from our end are adding to that frustration.

To fix it, we’re investing in resourcing, automation and tightened processes wherever we can, having hard conversations with providers – and yet these changes appear to not be enough.

At a certain point, we have to stop and ask: are we solving the right problem, and are we asking the right questions?

Because if improvement work only treats symptoms, without addressing underlying causes, we will not get sustained change.

We recently engaged the Bevington Group to help us examine the complaints system from end to end. They analysed close to 9000 unique cases to understand:

• How cases move through the lifecycle
• Where work pauses or loops
• Provider behaviour
• How decisions are made, and 
• What is driving demand in the first place

What the review confirmed is that the delay our consumers are experiencing is not the result of a single issue–it’s a systemic issue.

Some of those drivers sit within the TIO, including how we design processes and how work moves between teams – as well as how consistently cases are managed.

But a significant proportion of these drivers sit outside us.

A large share of case time is not spent actively resolving complaints, it’s spent waiting for providers to act, supply information, or provide the right information that can progress the case accordingly.

This creates a cycle of rework, follow-ups, clarification, and repeated engagement that extends timeframes for everyone involved.

A significant proportion of complaints are also what we would call ‘failure demand’–issues that should not have come to the TIO in the first place. 

This is when complaints arise from systemic or repeat problems, or issues that could have been resolved much earlier with better communication and accountability. 

And this aligns closely with what we hear from consumers:

• They’ve tried to resolve an issue, often multiple times, before coming to us
• They’ve experienced delays, inconsistent answers, and a lack of follow-through
• And by the time they reach the TIO, positions on both sides are often already entrenched.

The Bevington review also highlighted variation across providers.

Some engage consistently, respond on time, and focus on resolution.

Others are slower to respond, provide incomplete information, and rely more heavily on the TIO to manage communication.

And that variation matters.

Because it directly affects how quickly outcomes can be reached. And too many of the cases that are taking up time are because a provider uplift is required and systemic fixes need to happen.

This raises an important question for the TIO.

How do we create a system that rewards early resolution, rather than escalation?

Because the most effective dispute resolution is the one that never needs to happen. And the best outcome for consumers and telco trust is a fair response the first time around.

These lessons don’t just apply to telecommunications - they matter for what comes next.

Digital platforms have made life, business and communications easier, but protections and pathways to resolve complaints haven’t kept pace.

The gap between consumer expectation and reality is widening and harm is continuing to grow.

There is an opportunity to take what we’ve learnt, often the hard way, and build those protections in from the outset, rather than retrofitting ad-hoc regulation after failure or harm has occurred. 

And this brings us back to what we do now, with the challenge of rebuilding trust right in front of us – and the lessons, hopefully behind us.

Our commitment to the sector

The TIO has a role to play in rebuilding trust and reputation.  
 
In the next 12 months, we’ll focus on building a system that’s more responsive, more consistent end-to-end and better equipped to meet demand, now and into the future.

In FY 27, we’ll address the underlying drivers of performance and strengthen accountability and operational discipline. 

It will mean clearer expectations, better visibility of where time is being spent, and a sharper focus on resolving issues effectively, not just progressing cases through the system. 

We will take a more structured approach to working with you to address delays and reduce repeat issues at the source. 

This is the work we commit to take forward.

But we can’t do it alone.

This next phase relies on how we work together to improve outcomes for consumers, not just those coming to the TIO, but those across the industry.

And that brings us back, full circle, to whether we’re willing, all of us, to shift from debate to delivery, in order to do that.

Or risk the alternative of slowing down change at the exact moment it needs to speed up.

Because if we spend more time arguing than acting, there are no winners. 

Not the consumers, who continue to come to the TIO. 

Not the industry, facing falling trust.

And not the Government, stepping in when outcomes fall short of public expectations.

It needs to start with how we engage with one another.

Listening with intent to understand issues, not defend our position.

Achieving compliance is the baseline, but it will not be the benchmark that keeps up with consumer’s needs, wants and expectations.

Are we going to wait for every part of the industry to be scrutinised before we act. Who wants to bear further interrogation in another Senate inquiries? Are we really going to wait for a Royal Commission to determine what we do next? 

I’m not blind to the fact that the telco regulatory landscape is difficult to navigate. Its costly, time-intensive, overlapping, and the question has to be asked: Is it best serving your customers?

I’m comfortable to say I don’t think so.

Regulatory reform is required but it will be a long road. 

What we can’t lose sight of what’s in our power to change on the frontlines now. Now is the time to take charge of how the telco ecosystem works for consumers today, how we respond when something goes wrong and how together we lean into the challenges before us.

If we get that right, if we are fair, consistent and reliable while delivering the services consumers deserve, I’m confident trust will follow.

Thank you.