Telstra is upgrading 850,000 home and small business customers to 50Mbps speeds for free as it moves to make the faster tier its new standard for bundles.
The upgrades will take place over the next few months and all new customers that sign up for a $79 and above bundle will be connected to the 50Mbps tier as a standard. New customers will also be given a free smart modem with 4G mobile backup.
The shift effectively kills off the telco's 25Mbps option, which is by far the most popular option among Australians. According to NBN Co, more than 80 percent of end users had purchased 25Mbps plans on the network.
Late last year, NBN Co slashed prices on its NBN 50 (50Mbps download speeds) and NBN 100 wholesale offerings to encourage customers to take up the faster speeds. NBN Co also announced today that it would extend a promotional offer that discounts additional bandwidth by almost 50 percent for RPSs until October.
Telstra said the decision to upgrade customers would help provide customers with typical minimum speeds above the ACCC's guidelines of 60 percent of maximum speed during peak times.
“Broadband performance can be impacted by a number of factors. Some of these are managed by retail service providers like Telstra, and others are controlled by NBN Co," said Telstra's head of fixed products Jana Kotatko.
“We want to help customers understand this and provide them with all the right ingredients to make sure their in-home connection is as strong as it can be. Giving more customers the smart modem, along with increasing their NBN speed tier and the ongoing focus on providing the best speeds possible are all part of the way we’re helping customers make the most of their broadband service.”
Telstra in November agreed to compensate 42,000 NBN customers that could not reach internet speeds they were advertised as capable of.
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