COLAC and district Telstra customers are suffering with slow internet connections as the network struggles to meet demand.

The phone giant apologised to its Colac and district customers for the strained wireless internet and admitted its Next G network was congested.

Telstra south-west Victoria general manager Bill Mundy said the growing popularity of smartphones and tablet computers, which had permanent connections to the network, caused the congestion.

“The Next G network is currently under a lot of pressure – Telstra has recognised this and we are working towards building more capacity into the network,” Mr Mundy said.

“We hope to have that work completed by the end of June,” he said.

“We obviously apologise for the inconvenience but the reason the congestion is occurring is just the pure popularity of the smartphones, associated tablets and wireless connections.

“We are constantly working as hard as we can to increase capacity to satisfy the demand.”

Colac Telstra Store group operations manager Chris Oldaker said Colac and district Next G customers’ connection issues were typical symptoms of a congested network.

“The typical symptoms our customers are experiencing are not being able to establish an internet connection, poor or unreliable performance once connected and unexpected loss of connection,” Mr Oldaker said.

“All these symptoms are the usual signs of a congested network and tend to be most commonly experienced during peak usage times throughout the day,” he said.

Mr Mundy said the company was already working to relieve the clogged connection and deliver better internet to its customers in the region.

Patrick Stoddart, IT specialist at Colac’s Ball and Croft Betta Electrical, said more phone towers would alleviate the pressure on the network.

“There are overuse problems and lack of towers, it’s both,” he said.

“I find Next G network is slow sometimes because so many people are using it.”

Mr Mundy said network overuse was a direct result of more people connecting to new technology.

“The inherent requirement of those smartphones to remain connected all the time, it is causing the congestion on our network,” he said.

“We are well aware of it, we monitor our network and we recognise these problems early.”

Mr Mundy said Colac wasn’t the only region experiencing a slow and unreliable Next G network due to popular new technologies.

“The pressure that is on the Next G network in Colac is certainly being experienced in a number of other areas in south-west Victoria,” he said.

“We put in place plans to relieve the congestion as soon as we indentify where our problem spots are.”

 

Tags: Technology, Telstra