EXCLUSIVE: Telstra cops thousands of complaints a day - Alston - News - Communications

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This story was printed from ZDNet Australia.
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EXCLUSIVE: Telstra cops thousands of complaints a day - Alston

By Cass Warneminde, ZDNet Australia
November 27, 2002
URL: http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/communications/soa/EXCLUSIVE-Telstra-cops-thousands-of-complaints-a-day-Alston/0,130061791,120270253,00.htm

Telstra receives around 2,200 service-related complaints from its customers each day, the Federal Minister for Communications and Information Technology, Senator Richard Alston has admitted.

In an exclusive interview with ZDNet Australia , Senator Alston conceded the national carrier is the subject of a high level of service guarantee-related complaints, but defended its customer service track record.

"I suppose you need to look at it as a proportion of the total," he said. "Telstra has 11 million lines and there are about 11 billion calls a year and it receives about 2,200 customer service guarantee-related complaints a day. So you need to know how many complaints there are as proportion of the total before it becomes a problem," he said.

Claiming that Telstra has made "significant and consistent improvements" in relation to its service levels in recent years, Alston said the Government would wait to see "evidence of systematic mediocrity" before it intervened and took steps to address customers' service concerns.

"I'm not dismissing it. I'm just saying I don't think we should assume that somehow Telstra's service levels are woefully inadequate. They've certainly made very significant and consistent improvements on ordinary telephony in recent years and I think consumers will expect high standards from broadband. If we see evidence of systematic mediocrity we'll be doing something about that. At this stage though, I think it's a bit premature to suggest that Telstra is not up to scratch".

Alston's comments preceded the Government's announcement that it had postponed the sale of the remainder of Telstra due to the company's falling share price.

Keep visiting ZDNet Australia to read the full interview with Senator Alston, in which the Minister discusses broadband pricing, Australia's cyber-terrorism initiatives, anti-spam legislation, Internet censorship and his future in the Communications & IT portfolio.