iiNet and Internode are the latest to fall to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC)'s quest to force telcos into compensating National Broadband Network (NBN) customers who have been paying for speeds they are not receiving.
In total, around 8,000 iiNet customers and 3,000 Internode customers will be offered remedies, including moving to a lower-speed plan with a refund, or exiting their plan with a refund and no fees.
According to the ACCC, between 2015 and 2017, both providers engaged in misleading or deceptive conduct or made false or misleading representations -- iiNet advertised its 100Mbps plan as "up to 100Mbps: This is our fastest option and is sure to impress", and Internode advertised it as "NBN Platinum: up to 100/40 Mbps".
However, 7,621 or 64 percent of customers on a 100/40Mbps [PDF][1] iiNet fibre-to-the-node (FttN) plan could not receive speeds of 100Mbps; of these, 1,925 or 25 percent could also not receive 50/20Mbps speeds, 126 or 2 percent could not reach 25/5Mbps, and six customers could not attain 12/1Mbps.
Of the FttN iiNet customers paying for a 25/5Mbps plan, meanwhile, 742 could not reach these speeds, while 23 could not reach 12/1Mbps. Twelve customers paying for the 12/1Mbps speed tier could not reach these speeds.
Across its fibre-to-the-basement (FttB) customers, 75 who were paying for 100/40Mbps could not reach these speeds; while five customers paying for 12/5Mbps could not reach 25Mbps, and two of those could not even reach 12/1Mbps.
On Internode's 100/40Mbps plan, 1,720 or 34 percent of FttN customers [PDF][2] could not receive 100Mbps speeds, with 479 of these also unable to receive 50/20Mbps speeds, 36 of these unable to receive 25/5Mbps, and one unable to receive 12/1Mbps.