What is a complaint?

A complaint is when you tell us you’re dissatisfied with the products and services we provide. This may include how we handle your reported faults, or interactions with our staff. You have a right to complain.

“No bull” is a strong part of Aussie Broadband’s culture. We are human, and sometimes we get things wrong. However, our commitment is that when we do, we own up to our mistakes and we’re transparent with you about how we fix them. This approach includes making sure that you are making a complaint – if we’re not certain, we’ll ask.

Our main aim is to resolve all complaints immediately (although we may not always be able to do so). All our complaints handling is free of charge.

How to make a complaint?

You can make a complaint to us by:

If you do not wish to handle a complaint yourself, you can nominate someone else to do it for you. If you plan to nominate someone, just let us know by contacting us (as above). We can also assist if you need help to make and/or progress your complaint.

If you are experiencing financial hardship, we also provide support via our financial hardship policy.

If accessibility is an issue, you can also use these Australian Government provides services to help make your complaint:

  • National Relay Service: 133677
  • Translating & Interpreting Service: 131450

We are very interested in feedback on how to make our services more accessible.

What happens once you make a complaint?

Case number

When you make a complaint, we will give you a unique case number that you can quote to receive updates:

  • if you make your complaint by phone or in person, we’ll give you this number straight away
  • if you make your complaint via email, webform, post or voice message, we will send your number to your primary nominated email address within 2 working days

Initial assessment

When we receive your complaint, we assess it as either standard or urgent.

Urgent complaints are when:

  • You have applied for or been accepted as experiencing financial hardship and the subject of your complaint can be reasonably presumed to contribute to or aggravate your financial hardship;
  • Your complaint involves a service that is about to be or has been disconnected, and due process has not been followed;
  • You are complaining about a priority assistance service; or
  • You have disclosed that you are in a Family or Domestic violence situation and the subject of your complaint can be reasonably presumed to contribute to or aggravate your circumstances

Investigation and resolution

For complaints that we can’t resolve immediately, we will:

  • investigate as necessary, and then contact you within 15 working days to discuss how to resolve your complaint. In most cases it will be sooner but sometimes, it may take longer than 15 working days to investigate your complaint and if this happens, we will contact you to let you know why and provide you with an updated timeframe.
  • implement any agreed resolution within 10 business days, unless:
    • you have agreed otherwise, or
    • you have not yet completed something you agreed to do, or
    • the issue has been caused by a notified mass outage of service
  • for urgent complaints, contact you as soon as possible with our suggested resolution and do our best to implement it within 2 working days

If we hit delays to what we have proposed, we’ll contact you as soon as possible to let you know and propose new timelines. If you are not happy with our proposals at any stage, you can go to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman.

Monitoring your complaint

We will provide regular updates to you on how your complaint is progressing but if you want to check in at any stage on how things are going, please contact us (as above).

Closure

Once your complaint has been resolved, we’ll let you know. We will not close a complaint until you have agreed it has been resolved (unless there are special circumstances – see “attempts to make contact” and “frivolous or vexatious complaints” below).

If you wish to close your complaint at any time, please contact us (as above).

What if you’re not happy with our process?

You can ask us to escalate your complaint if you’re not satisfied with what we are doing, or you think it’s reasonable that your complaint be treated as urgent. In both instances, we will escalate your complaint to our Complaints Manager for consideration and response.

  • If you ask for an escalation, we’ll respond within 5 working days
  • If you ask for an upgrade to urgent, we’ll respond within 2 working days
    We’ll also let you know about your options for external dispute resolution such as the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman.

Attempts to make contact

If we can’t contact you via your preferred method, we will write to you with details of our attempts and a request to contact us.

If you don’t respond within 10 working days, we will consider your complaint resolved.

Frivolous or vexatious complaints

Sometimes, after careful consideration, we may decide that:

  • we are unable to do anything further to resolve your complaint or assist you
  • your behaviour or complaint is frivolous or vexatious

If we decide this, we’ll tell you within 5 working days of making this decision, and give you the reasons behind it. We’ll also let you know about your options for external dispute resolution such as the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman.

If you are unsatisfied

If at any point you are unsatisfied with our handling of your complaint, progress or outcome you can:

  • contact us and we will escalate your complaint internally, or
  • opt for an external dispute resolution such as the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman (noting the TIO may request you contact us first)

The Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman can be contacted by:

Download a PDF of our complaints policy here.