A money expert has criticized NBN Co’s proposal to turbocharge the three fastest speed tiers, calling it a ‘price increase in disguise’.
NBN plans to increase download speeds for customers connected via fiber to the premises or via cable TV-based hybrid fiber coax connections.
The move will increase speeds from a maximum of 100/20 Mbps to 500/50 Mbps on the NBN Home Fast plan and triple download speeds on their Superfast plan to 750/50 Mbps, while Ultrafast increases to 750-1000/50-100 Mbps.
But the NBN’s cheapest plans will remain the same – and finance guru Joel Gibson warns it could see low-income households left behind.
And up to 70 percent of the country may have to pay more each month to access the higher speeds.
He said the new high-speed plans will only widen the gap between the haves and have-nots who cannot afford ultra-fast internet.
A money expert has slammed NBN Co’s proposal to ‘turbocharge’ the three fastest speed tiers, calling it a ‘price rise in disguise’
Sir. Gibson said the massive speed boost will only benefit the 30 per cent of Australians paying over $100 a month for their NBN – and is designed to tempt them to upgrade and spend more.
“(Most) Australians don’t have fast, superfast and ultrafast NBN plans,” he said in a TikTok video linked to the WhistleOut comparison site.
’70 per cent are on standard or basic NBN plans, now it’s the ones that cost under $100.
‘I’ve been working with WhistleOut on this to try and raise awareness of the fact that seven out of 10 households are currently missing out.’
Sir. Gibson claims NBN is trying to pressure Aussies to upgrade their internet plans, but says “it’s just not fair” to make people pay more in a cost of living crisis.
“There has been a $7 billion investment in fiber in the network by the federal government and by NBN Co in recent years,” he said.
‘And what they now want is for people to make the most of the extra new infrastructure by upgrading to faster NBN plans
‘That’s all well and good, but not everyone can afford to pay over $100 a month for internet access.’
Sir. Gibson says NBN needs to ‘read the space’.
“If they can massively increase the maximum speed on a fast NBN plan, I’m sure they can do it on a standard NBN plan, which is what the largest proportion of Australians currently have,” he said.
“We should all be getting faster speeds because the cost of providing that infrastructure gets lower over time, we shouldn’t have to pay extra.”
NBN told Daily Mail Australia it plans to offer the three accelerated speed tiers at no extra wholesale cost, but retail prices were out of its control.
NBN Co told Daily Mail Australia it plans to offer the three accelerated speed tiers at no extra wholesale cost, but was unable to provide further information on whether retailers would increase the price of their plans
NBN stressed that there will be no changes to the price or speed of their lower tier plans.
“This reflects our intention to maintain a wide range of products at different price points to meet different customer requirements and budgets,” a spokesperson said.
‘Currently around 7,000 customers a week place fiber upgrade orders on average, and per By 31 December 2023, almost 200,000 premises had been upgraded to a full fiber service.’
NBN Co plans to deliver these accelerated services to customers before the end of the year.
