It’s been more than two weeks since an NBN tower toppled over in Bairnsdale and one frustrated resident is still without her internet connection.
Lee Anderson lives not far from the tower site in Lanes Road and despite repeated calls to Telstra has not been able to get any clear response about when her internet service will be reconnected.
A frustrated Mrs Anderson told the Advertiser: “I can’t access the internet on my computer which means I can’t receive emails, so I can’t pay bills, it really is very annoying.”
“I rely on the internet for contact.”
Mrs Anderson said she had tried to communicate her plight with Telstra, but “everytime I ring up, I get the Philippines, so I am finding it very frustrating”.
“I’d just like to know if they can offer me something in the meantime, until I’m fully restored to the NBN again.”
When the NBN tower went down on August 18, in what police believe was a deliberate act of sabotage, about 390 customers were affected by the outage.
NBN managed to reinstall 305 services within days, while about 84 other customers still remained without connectivity.
A NBN spokesperson said they were hoping to modify links with other tower sites to get the service back up and running, but Mrs Anderson is still without her internet.
While she can still receive calls on her mobile phone, Mrs Anderson says it’s the internet that she desperately needs and feels out of touch without it.
A spokesperson for NBN said only about 30 customers remained unconnected and the company was working to provide temporary connectivity devices, such as dongles, until the situation can be resolved.
The NBN tower has now been removed from Lanes Road, where it toppled over, and a replacement is expected in the not too distant future.
PICTURED: Lee Anderson, who lives on the outskirts of Bairnsdale, is still without her internet service following the toppling of the NBN tower on August 16. K1160-9171
