How small businesses can prepare for outages and faults

Recent outages are a good reminder for small businesses to prepare for unexpected phone and internet outages so you can continue to trade with minimal disruption.

Through our experience helping small business consumers resolve service complaints with their telco, we’ve come up with some tips for protecting your business when the unexpected occurs.

Before an outage happens, prepare a back-up plan

Most businesses rely on their phone and internet services but many don’t have a back-up plan to protect against financial loss.

• Check whether your provider offers interim services when faults occur
• Check your phone and internet agreements and make sure you know who to contact for assistance in the event of an outage
• Have a pre-paid mobile internet device ready and pre-paid sim cards for mobile

When an outage or fault has occurred, take steps to protect your business

• Contact your provider to report the fault
• When a telephone service fails, ask the provider to divert incoming calls to an alternative phone number
• When the internet fails, activate your pre-paid mobile internet device
• Keep a record of the trouble-shooting steps you’ve taken to try and resolve the issue
• Maintain regular contact with your provider, answer questions and provide information that helps identify the cause of the fault
• If possible, let your customer base know about the potential disruption of service

What if you experience a business loss as a result of an outage or fault?

Keep detailed records of the outage’s effect on your customers and business partners, and any losses incurred. For example, keep emails from customers who’ve had difficulty contacting you or making a purchase. To claim compensation for business loss, you will need to show steps taken to protect your business from the impacts of losing service.

Download the consumer guide to What to do if your business loses services (PDF, 153KB)

What the TIO can do if you incur a business loss as a result of an outage

We can consider a claim for financial loss caused by a breach of an obligation that a telco owes the consumer. To assess a claim, we would:

• Determine if there was a breach by the telco
• Assess if the breach caused the loss you are claiming
• Determine the amount of the loss

We will also consider what is a fair and reasonable outcome would be.