A NEWLY formed National Broadband Network (NBN) Local team dedicated to improving customer experience across the region visited Mount Gambier last Wednesday to meet with key stakeholders.
Local government representatives, information technology advisers, members from the business sector and Member for Barker Tony Pasin were some of the stakeholders in attendance for the roundtable discussion held at Mount Gambier City Hall.
The stakeholders were able to express concerns with members from the NBN Local team, including head of NBN Local in South Australia and the Northern Territory Tim Saul.
Mr Saul said the discussion was a great opportunity to hear about the positives and negatives of NBN in the region and how the broadband network could be improved.
“What NBN Local is all about is educating our communities as to what they need to do to get connected and what choices they have,” Mr Saul said.
“Insight from stakeholders like these is invaluable in informing those decisions.”
Despite Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull recently declaring the NBN project a “mistake”, Mr Saul said the broadband network is in a “great spot” in the Limestone Coast.
“We are almost complete in the South East, we have over 30,000 premises that can currently connect to the NBN, compared to Australia where we are not quite 60pc complete across the nation,” he said.
“We are really confident in NBN as nine out of 10 people are having a great experience, but unfortunately if 40,000 people per week are connecting and one in 10 are having a bad experience that is a big number and still way too many for us.”
Mr Saul said angst among people in the public formed part of the reason for the introduction of the NBN Local team.
“That is why we are introducing a number of customer experience initiatives, one of which is NBN Local,” he said.
“It is all about education and letting people know about all the different elements as to why you might not be getting the best experience.”
With the fixed line rollout of NBN complete in more than 97pc of his electorate, Mr Pasin said most of the Limestone Coast community was already reaping the benefits of the NBN.
“More than three million people around the country are already reaping the benefits of NBN’s next generation connectivity, which is fast and reliable, enabling households and small businesses to be more productive and better connected for years to come,” Mr Pasin said.
“In Barker the fixed line rollout is 97pc complete, with over 84,000 premises ready for service or already connected.”
Mr Pasin said the NBN Local team would assist people to connect to the broadband network.
“For those not yet connected, it is fantastic that we now have the team on the ground in the Limestone Coast ready to assist residents and businesses,” Mr Pasin said.
For the broader community, the NBN Local team will now visit locations across the Limestone Coast over the next few weeks to implement that education.
“We are starting a Limestone Coast tour, visiting Kingston, Robe, Millicent, Naracoorte, Penola, Beachport and Mount Gambier again this week,” Mr Saul said.
“That is all about community, we will park in the main streets of those towns and invite people to come along and have dialogue with us.”
