Following last Wednesday’s outage, Optus will give postpaid mobile customers at least 200GB of bonus data, while offering prepaid customers unlimited data weekends until the end of the year.
All postpaid customers will be able to access this extra data from today. The first 100GB will be added to your current billing month. If you activate it before December 31 you will get 100GB each month for three months.
To activate it you need to do the following:
- Log in to the My Optus app.
- Navigate to the Service tab
- Tap Add-ons, go to Data
- Select 100GB for $0 option.
It may take up to four hours before the bonus data is available.
Prepaid customers will get their first unlimited data weekend starting November 18.
Internet plan customers affected by the outage are being offered speed boosts. In a statement, Optus CEO Kelly Bayer Rosmarin said “We truly appreciate our customers’ patience and understanding as we worked to restore our operations yesterday."
“We know that there is nothing we can do to make up for yesterday and what customers want most is for our network to work all the time – which is our number one priority – but we also want to acknowledge their patience and loyalty by giving them additional data to help during the holidays, when so many people consume more data with friends and family."
Speaking with media last week Bayer Rosmarin indicated that Optus wouldn't provide direct financial compensation because it would probably amount to less than $2.
Customers from telcos that use Optus' network and were also affected should contact their telco directly.
The Australian Communications Consumer Action Network (ACCAN) has resources that may be able to assist affected customers in understanding their rights and how to make a claim for compensation.
Optus outage cause finally explained
In its statement, Optus also addressed the root cause of the outage which was a routing issue.
"In common with major global telecommunication networks, the Optus network is designed with multiple layers of fall back and redundancy. At the heart of this is a modern intelligent router network developed with the world’s leading vendors."
"Despite this, a network event yesterday triggered a cascading failure which resulted in the shutdown of services to our customers".
The nationwide outage which plunged hospitals and transport networks into chaos has sparked three separate investigations.
Communications Minister Michelle Rowland announced that the Albanese Government will undertake a post-incident review. Separately, a Senate inquiry will investigate two key areas; how Optus handled the incident and how it compensates customers, and how the government can ensure reliable coverage.
Finally, the Australian Communications and Media Authority is looking into Optus' compliance around access to Triple Zero.
Optus said "Our engineers are investigating thoroughly and we will learn from this outage and continue to improve. We welcome, and intend to cooperate fully with, the Government investigations."
Dylan Crismale
Digital Content Editor
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