Oliver Peterson: Australian correspondent on the Optus outage that impacted triple-0 calls

Australian telco giant Optus  is investigating another network outage that led to nine failed triple-0 calls on the NSW south coast.

Optus has issued a statement saying the problem stemmed from a mobile phone tower site in Dapto.

It affected calls between 3am and 12:20pm on Sunday, including calls to the triple-0 network.

Australian correspondent Oliver Peterson says this incident will cause significant damage to the relationship Optus has with its customers.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Olli Peterson six PR Perth Live Presenters with us. Hello, Oli,
Hey Eather, talk about the ref go.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
On, h I was actually playing golf afternoon. Yeah yeah,
I was just waiting for the return. I was worring
for the return. About in Perth this week? An you
coming over?

Speaker 1 (00:16):
Yeah? So so, yeah, you don't really want to talk
about this then?

Speaker 2 (00:21):
No, not really, no, not really, It's okay. You know
we were robbed.

Speaker 1 (00:26):
Since we've had the bleeders Low cup by the way.

Speaker 2 (00:28):
What Australia New Zealand. I think you've I don't think
we've had it about twenty years now.

Speaker 1 (00:33):
I don't know if you've been alive for it. Anyway,
Look you'll get it too, and don't worry about it now. Jeez.
I'll tell you what. However bad your day is, it's
worse with Optus, isn't it.

Speaker 2 (00:43):
I'll tell you what. Stephen Rue would be ruining the
decision pardon the partner taking on the job of the
CEO of op this because yet another triple zero outage
on the weekend, and it was for quite some time
as well, from about three o'clock on that Saturday or
Sunday morning. It wasn't the end three Sunday morning till
about midday Sunday in the Dapdo area, so we're talking

(01:04):
around Woollongong, about an hour and a half south of Sydney.
The Optus network went down in regards to triple zero
phone calls. Nine affected phone calls, with that one person
deciding when they needed an ambulance to actually use a
different phone that was an Optus and they got connected
straight through. Police have done the welfare checks on the
other eight. Everybody else is okay, but this is just terrible.

(01:25):
They do not know how or why this one has happened,
but it makes you wonder there are severe problems aren't
there now with the entire network if this has happened
again within a week. Stephen ru Tomorrow Tuesday will be
meeting the Federal Communications Minister Anika Wells, who's returning from
her delegation being part of the United Nations gathering there
in New York. And you could just imagine how hostile

(01:47):
those conversations are going to be.

Speaker 1 (01:49):
I mean, they must be losing customers at a rate
or not.

Speaker 2 (01:52):
Say absolutely they would be, but they were when the
data hack, which is not that long ago. It's just
over a year ago. So look, the thing about Australia
is if you live outside of the metropolitan area of
one of our capital cities, chances are you're not a
customer of Optics or Votaphone anyway, you're with Telstra because
you've got that national network. But this is going to

(02:12):
cause significant damage to the customer relationship between the telco
and Australians. And look there's calls over in this country
as well that the license should be taken off Optus,
which is obviously on now by Singtel, the Singaporean back company,
and redistributed to somebody else. So I don't know that
the government will go that far, but I'll tell you
what some of the language from Prime Minister Albanizi and
Anika Well's the Communications Minister. They are not impressed.

Speaker 1 (02:34):
I can imagine. Now, run me through what Clive Palmer's done.

Speaker 2 (02:38):
Oh he just loves, particularly going to war with where
I live in Western Australia, the WA government. So he
was effectively trying to quote bankrupt the state with a
claim that he made and legislation was rushed in during
the COVID years in regards to some of the iron
Ore royalties and the royalties that he had to pay
to Western Australia. The WA government claimed that this was

(03:01):
going to again bankrupt the state the tune of thirty
billion dollars. He didn't like it, so he took it
on in all the courts in Australia. It's been thrown out,
but he's not happy with that. He's going all the
way to a court in Switzerland to try and take
on effectively the Australian government. His argument is that because
of what happened through the COVID years, it affected his trade.
But because he's an Australian citizen, he's not entitled to

(03:22):
even basically take this on in the court. So look,
he just enjoys the theater. Let's be blunt header. He
enjoys the show. He never liked the fact that he
wasn't allowed in toyway, particularly during those COVID years, to
run his businesses. So this is all, I believe, a
bit of a charade. But yeah, he's still trying to
get thirty billion dollars out of Western Australia. Are nice?

Speaker 1 (03:43):
Trya hey, do you believe that solar panels can add
twenty three thousand dollars to the value of your house.

Speaker 2 (03:48):
Oh see, this is what I find fascinating. Now do
you have much sun in New Zealand? But he's not.

Speaker 1 (03:53):
Really wrong with you.

Speaker 2 (03:57):
You might have the blenderslow carts, but do you get
any suns? I don't know what I'd rather, but I
thought this was really interesting because we just had all
of this. You know, it comes out all the time, right,
but the annual what's everybody looking up? What was everybody
searching for when they're trying to buy a home and
it's down to granny flats and pulls? Now again, do
you have pools and us?

Speaker 1 (04:18):
You're a pain?

Speaker 2 (04:20):
Sorry, yeah, that I can't help myself today. But I
find this interesting, and I it's not something that we
really consider that you would look at that. But when
you have a federal government policy at the moment, which
is all about giving your rebates for putting sol and
batteries in your home, you can probably understand where this
sort of research comes out. But twenty three thousand dollars
extra to your home having a few panels on the roof.

(04:40):
I went to Google Earth to just have a look
in my street. Now I don't have panels, but I
think I'm in the minority, Like there's about twelve houses
in my street and there's only two or three of
us that don't have panels. So look, I might be
missing out on something, but it's going to cost you
more than twenty three thousand dollars to install these things.
So I don't know if it adds twenty three thousand dollars.
I just think it's the clean energy mob to try
to get us to all sign up. And by the way,

(05:02):
and as for all governments around the world, it's your
job to be able to provide the infrastructure to keep
the lights on, not down to homeowners like turn it up.
They're just you know, shrugging their shoulders and saying it's
back on us to do it.

Speaker 1 (05:13):
Oh, I love you, Ollie. Thanks very much, Olive Petersen
six pm Perth Live presenter. For more from Heather Duplessy
Allen Drave, listen live to news talks it'd be from
four pm weekdays, or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.