A new report from the Australian Telecommunications and Media Authority reveals that leading Australian telcos have been steadily lifting their game on network reliability, priority assistance, and the customer service guarantee.

The ACMA’s ‘Telecommunications Performance Bulletin’ for the 2008-9 fiscal year, compiled from data reported to the regulator by Telstra, Optus and AAPT, shows the three telcos delivering general improvements across the period – albeit still falling short of the ACMA’s benchmarks in some cases.

Though not currently enshrined in regulation, the benchmarks are based on recommendations by the 2002 Regional Telecoms Inquiry and other research, as well as informal arrangements between carriers and the federal government.

On the CSG front, Optus and AAPT passed the benchmark for both in-place and new service connections, meeting the required timeframes in over 90% of cases. Telstra cleared the bar for in-place connections and, though missing it by less than 2% for new service connections, still improved its performance against 2007-8. However, Telstra did report an increase in the year in CSG extreme failures for connections (up 79%) and fault repair, while Optus managed to drive both figures down by over 60%.

Regarding priority assistance, Telstra reported that its ranks of priority assistance customers at the end of FY09 had swollen to 195,173, a 20% increase on the previous year. And although it managed to connect or repair services for priority customers within its 24-hour timeframe in less than 90% of cases for most of the year, missing the ACMA benchmark, it improved on its FY08 performance – and in the last quarter of the year actually reached the bar in both urban and rural areas.

Meanwhile, performance data on the Network Reliability Framework showed several positive signs. On monthly average, 98.72% of Telstra’s services did not experience a fault; services were available on average for 99.91% of each month; and the average downtime for telephone services with a fault fell to 51 hours, an improvement on the FY08 figure of 63 hours.

Finally, the results of the bulletin showed a continuing decline in the number of payphones run by Telstra and other operators. The total number of phones dwindled 12.8% across FY09 to 39,329 at the end of the period, while payphone usage also declined; the number of calls made from Telstra-operated units dropped 14.4% and from privately owned units by 19.3% across the year. Telstra itself removed 1,573 payphones from service across the financial year.