The image above is a graphic illustration of mobile speeds available on Optus (left) vs Telstra (right) in Wodonga. I have complained repeatedly that Optus needs to fix their network here, with no result. After the network fell off a cliff around 12 months ago, I spoke to Optus only to be told the towers here were ‘congested’.
Naturally I enquired about when a new tower / new capacity would be added to remedy the problem. Optus were unable to commit to a date for the new mobile tower, explaining that naming a date would only result in disappointment should circumstances result in a delay.
After 12 months of discussing the issue with Optus I had enough and moved to Telstra’s superior NextG network with the iPhone 4S. After the issues experienced by Vodafone customers, I certainly wasn’t alone in the switch to Australia’s largest telco.
Speed tests had progressively gotten worse as congestion increased and business traffic was prioritised over consumers. The net result was that Optus’ network was so bad that upload speeds were so bad that posting a picture to Facebook often failed. To exacerbate the situation, I actually had to go outside my house to make a phone call – ridiculous in 2011.
The breaking point was this weeks Tech Knowledge segment on 105.7 The River that I do each week at 7:10am on Wednesdays. Despite being outside, the presenters Kev Poulton and Luisa Pelizzari couldn’t even hear me, which is completely unacceptable !
Optus, fix your damn network! Your new customer guarantees are cute, but if you were actually proud of your network investment and capacity, then you’d open the offer to existing customers as well.
The image above indicates the Speed Test results for West Wodonga on Optus vs Telstra. Optus managed 98ms Ping, 0.60 Mbps, Upload 0.27 Mbps, while Telstra slaughtered it with a slightly higher 204ms Ping but 3.59Mbps download and 2.19 Mbps Upload. Flawless Victory !
Goodbye Optus, nice to know you, but your horrible service has caused me to move to Telstra.
