The increase highlights the growing impact telecommunications service problems can have on people's daily lives.
Complaint case studies from the reporting period highlight these consequences. One consumer spent more than six weeks without internet after a delay in connecting a new service. During that time, they were unable to work from home and their children had to rely on alternative locations to complete schoolwork.
In another case, a regional consumer lost mobile coverage during an active bushfire. Without a reliable service, they were unable to receive emergency alerts or communicate with neighbouring landowners at a critical time.
These experiences demonstrate that connectivity issues can affect far more than convenience. Complaint data and case studies show that service failures can impact work, education, access to information, safety and other aspects of daily life.
The complaints also highlight the importance of both service reliability and the way issues are managed when problems occur. While technical faults and outages can happen, consumers consistently expect timely support, clear communication and effective resolution when they do.
For providers, regulators, government and community organisations, complaints about non-financial loss provide valuable insight into how Australians experience telecommunications services in practice. They help identify where service failures are having the greatest impact and where improvements in processes, communications and consumer protections may be needed.
For the telco sector, the message is clear: reliability is only part of the consumer experience. How providers communicate, support people and resolve problems can make a significant difference to the level of harm consumers experience when services fail.