Telecom's Internet Services Investigated
Posted on: Friday, 3 December 2004, 15:00 CST
THE Commerce Commission is investigating whether Telecom is acting anti-competitively in the way it sells high-speed Internet services.
Commission spokesman Jackie Maitland said it was looking at the bundled discount of "Jetstream", Telecom's high-speed Internet product with tolls, the reduction in Telecom's Xtra charges, the price of Jetstream for resale to other companies and the price of the "unbundled bitstream service" (UBS), a wholesale high-speed Internet service.
It was an investigation under the Commerce Act conducted by the commission's enforcement team.
Telecom spokesman John Goulter said the company was surprised by the investigation.
"We are totally confident that our plans are entirely lawful and robust under the Commerce Act," he said.
It was "odd" that the commission had given more information to the media about its investigation of Telecom's broadband sales than it had disclosed to Telecom.
He challenged figures that Australian specialist Paul Budde had quoted on how few broadband customers were not Telecom customers, showing that Telecom was not willing to wholesale its high-speed Internet services to competitors.
Mr Budde said only 1 per cent of broadband customers getting high- speed Internet services over Telecom's copper lines were non- Telecom customers. His figures appear to be taken from a Commerce Commission paper monitoring Telecom's broadband sales.
The commission's figures regard Telecom's UBS service as wholesale broadband. But Telecom appears to be counting its resale of Jetstream services as wholesaling.
Mr Goulter said of the 159,000 Jetstream connections, 25.5 per cent were customers of other internet service providers (ISP). Telecom expected the 25.5 per cent of ISP customers to be shifted on to the wholesale UBS service quite quickly.
A report in The Dominion Post that the UBS service was five months behind deadline was incorrect, Mr Goulter said. The UBS service had been scheduled for September but was not available till November because of technical difficulties.
Source: Dominion Post
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