Optus says there are no plans to compensate customers after the national outage

Optus CEO Kelly Bayer Rosmarin has confirmed that the telco will not provide refunds to the millions of customers affected by yesterday's outage. 

Bayer Rosmarin told The Daily Telegraph that "refunding people for one day is probably less than $2."

“We are going to look at how we reward our customers for their loyalty and patience. We might choose to do something that is more valuable."

What can you do?

The Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman (TIO) is directing unhappy Optus customers to contact their telco first. 

Under Optus' own mobile contract terms you may be entitled to a refund for the period your access was interrupted.

This is where the mention of $2 comes into play. Because the network was down for hours (and not days) any compensation (outside of the telco being more generous) is likely to amount to a few cents to a couple of dollars depending on which mobile or NBN plan you're on. 

If you're with one of Optus' Mobile Virtual Network Operators then it's best to contact them directly. 

If you're unhappy with your telcos response then you can file a complaint with the TIO.

For consumers, the TIO says it can consider claims for compensation for non-financial loss "where an unusual amount of physical inconvenience, time to resolve the complaint, or interference with expectation of enjoyment or peace of mind has occurred because of the action or inaction of the telco". 

For businesses, the TIO "can consider a claim for financial loss caused by a breach of an obligation that a telco owes a consumer".

"As part of an investigation, we will assess a claim by determining if there was a breach by the telco, assessing if the breach caused the loss being claimed, and determining the amount of loss."

Compensation claims made by consumers and small businesses are assessed on a case-by-case basis.

Businesses are urged to keep receipts and other records as proof of any losses that occurred during the outage. 

Government response

Minister for Communications Michelle Rowland has announced that the Alabanse Government "will undertake a post-incident telecommunications review into the Optus outage that affected millions of Australians yesterday".

The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) has also indicated that it has begun an assessment to investigate Optus' compliance regarding rules around emergency calls.

Aside from the Government and ACMA the Greens are calling for a federal parliamentary inquiry to examine what led to the outage. 

Greens senator Sarah Hanson Young said "We need to make sure that all Australians have access to affordable and reliable internet and telecommunication, because otherwise, life as we know it stops".

"This is not a small matter, and the parliament will have to look at what Optus can and should be doing, what they knew, how this failure happened, and there needs to be consequences of this type of outage."

In a statement, Andrew Sheridan, Optus Vice President of Regulatory and Public Affairs, said "Optus looks forward to fully cooperating with the proposed reviews by both the Department of Communications and the ACMA into yesterday’s network outage".

What caused the Optus network outage?

Specifics are still unknown but Optus has indicated that it was a "technical network issue" and not the result of a cyber attack.

Speaking in an interview for 7NEWS, Bayer Rosmarin said this was a "very rare occurrence" and a "root cause analysis will follow". 

"These outages do happen when you're running critical infrastructure and we do everything we can to make sure that they don't."