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Netlink Trust fined $150,000 for failing to fulfil home orders

This article is more than 12 months old

Fibre broadband network builder Netlink Trust (NLT) has been fined $150,000 for failing to deliver orders to home and business broadband users on time - its sixth fine in five years.

In the 12 months to June this year, the Singapore-listed company failed to deliver all home broadband orders within seven business days as required.

It connected between 92.75 per cent and 96.14 per cent of monthly residential orders in the stipulated timeframe.

The Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) also requires NLT to deliver 98 per cent of home broadband orders within three business days.

But NLT delivered only between 91.54 and 94.83 per cent.

In a statement yesterday, IMDA said delays were mainly due to consumers switching between service providers, requiring either a second optical fibre or the handing over of the first optical fibre to another service provider.

Today, more than 1.2 million households have subscribed to fibre broadband, which means more than 90 per cent of them have a broadband plan.

NLT's fine comprises $100,000 for causing delays to home broadband deliveries and $50,000 for delaying service deliveries to businesses.

It must complete business orders within eight weeks of sign-up. But it failed to meet the mark from January last year to March this year, during which it actually delivered between 88.74 and 99.8 per cent of all orders.

It also has to connect 80 per cent of new business sign-ups within four weeks, but failed to do it for five months, from January to May last year.

IMDA said that it considered the company's continuing efforts to provide services on time as well as the nature of end-user demands. It also considered delays caused by building owners in giving NLT access into the buildings.

IMDA said it expects NLT to ensure there is sufficient spare fibre in residential buildings to cater to all orders.

Chief executive officer Tong Yew Heng said: "We take our regulatory obligation on service delivery seriously. We have adopted measures to improve our QoS (quality of service) performance."

In October last year, IMDA fined the company $500,000 for similar failures. The six fines in the past five years totalled $2.14 million.

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