General News
5 February, 2025
Mornington Island fed up with Telstra's lack of service
Local leaders say the telco is not providing an adequate service to the community.
Mornington Island is suffering from increasing telecommunication outages with little explanation and delayed responses from Telstra, which has led some to raise concerns about the telco’s ability to assist the isolated community during an emergency.
Some councillors in the Gulf community are now demanding financial reimbursement after the island was again without telecommunications service for six days in January.
It follows similar prolonged outages late last year, which have lasted for up to a week, despite infrastructure upgrades taking place in November.
Mornington Shire Council’s information and communications technology manager Matthew Fox said there was a lack of communication from Telstra about expected timeframes to resolve connectivity issues.
Mr Fox gave one recent example where Telstra announced it would upgrade some of its infrastructure on the island in November.
However, the telco did not begin the scheduled outages until days after the dates reported on its public notices and also did not provide an explanation for the delays and inconvenience caused to the community.
“We got an original notice saying the outages would be on certain dates – then those days came and went, and the outage did not happen, so that became very frustrating for the community,” he told North West Weekly.
“Council had prepared the community for outages on these days, but then there was no communication from Telstra to let us know the dates had changed. The council is in a position where we have to inform the community about any outages that are taking place – so we need better communication from Telstra because whatever Telstra is doing at the moment it is not working because I am having to constantly chase them up for information.
“And Telstra is a big beast so it can be at least half a day or more before I receive a response – it’s beyond a joke.
“You expect to have one outage a month on the island but since the upgrades took place (in November) it has been even higher than that. This is a very vulnerable and isolated community and if Telstra cannot get the basics right, what are they going to be like in an emergency?”
Councillor Farrah Linden operates a social service organisation that relies on being able to remain in constant contact with vulnerable people and families on the island.
She said numerous community needs, ranging from pre-paid fuel to post office banking, were reliant on reliable Telstra service.
“There are so many times when we need to rely on internet and mobile service – this is the 21st century,” she said.
“We had a situation recently where a beloved Elder died, and we could not contact anyone to tell them to come to the hospital and pay their respects.
“Thank God someone was willing to drive around the island and go door to door to tell the community – but we also had no way of communicating it to people living off the island.
“We deserve better.”
Fellow councillor Renee Wilson said Telstra should provide financial compensation to reimburse account holders who are unable to use their services for extended periods.
Cr Wilson raised her concerns during a council meeting last week.
She said with the majority of residents on pre-paid mobile plans, Telstra could extend the time limits for credit or put additional credit into their accounts.
“There are just too many outages with Telstra and it’s also the length of time – sometimes it can be out for a week,” she said.
“As customers, we haven’t received any compensation or anything – so it is frustrating especially because we are so remote, it is not like we can just jump in the car and drive to another community.”
Telstra regional general manager Rachel Cliffe told North West Weekly that compensation was discussed on a case-by-case basis and customers could call the telco to discuss their individual situation.
“While we do our absolute best to keep the network running as smoothly as possible, unfortunately when working with technology things can go wrong,” she said.
“In January, we had two outages that impacted mobile coverage in the region due to power issues at our site.
“While we worked to restore coverage as quickly as possible, the island is only accessible by air which means our efforts can sometimes be delayed due to weather or the extra time it takes to fly critical equipment or parts to our site.
“We aim to share updates with our key stakeholders in each region as soon as possible and this process is consistent across the country.”
Telstra's failed beacon an aviation safety concern
Mornington Shire is awaiting answers from Telstra about when it will replace an extinguished beacon light on the telecommunication tower located on the island that has prompted a safety warning from the Civil Aviation Safety Authority.
The council’s information and communications technology manager Matthew Fox told North West Weekly that he was alerted to the issue when he discovered CASA had issued a hazard warning to all pilots flying through the area.
Mr Fox said he had been waiting more than 24 hours for a response from Telstra about when it planned to fix the faulty equipment.
“This is a significant safety issue that we are waiting for information about,” he said.
“I sent the query at 1pm yesterday and still haven’t heard from Telstra.”
When North West Weekly raised the beacon light concerns, Telstra regional general manager Rachel Cliffe admitted more work needed to be done.
“The delay isn’t good enough and we’re working to get it repaired,” she said
“The beacon light on our site needs replacing and we have been keeping CASA informed as per our normal process.”