After two weeks of repeatedly telling customers there was no outage and there must be something wrong with their phones, Telstra has finally fixed a software glitch that was preventing calls on the 4G network in Guyra.
Numerous Telstra customers had taken to social media to express their frustration at being unable to receive calls, and being told by Telstra there was no problem. Local IT specialist After a number of interventions, Telstra finally sent someone to Guyra to investigate, identifying the software issue.
“Telstra has resolved a software issue at the Guyra Telstra mobile base station that has been identified as the cause of recent 4G call connectivity problems for local residents,” said Mike Marom, the Regional General Manager for Telstra.
“While calls made and received on the Telstra 3G network were not impacted, the community was telling us that on many occasions calls made on our 4G network were being automatically diverted to message bank rather than be connected.”
“Following site visits, investigations by Telstra techs and a reset of all the software at our base station located on the New England Highway, the issue appears to have been resolved.”
That the issue was limited to 4G, and manually switching the phone to 3G would allow calls through again, was identified by Black Mountain local Michael Kean, who found the work around after many tests. He estimated 1000 people were affected by the issue.
“Does Guyra still have any Telstra techs? Need someone who could get past the lower level support people to get them to recognise that 4G VoLTE is not working properly on the South Guyra tower,” he posted in a local Facebook group.
Guyra locals had contacted both Member for Northern Tablelands Adam Marshall and federal Member for New England Barnaby Joyce to seek assistance after getting no help from Telstra customer service.
“We apologise to the Guyra community for any impact or inconvenience over the last couple of weeks,” Mr Marom said.
“We will continue to monitor the site to make sure it continues to operate normally.”
Mr Marom said that if residents notice the issue occurring again they encourage them to let Telstra know and they will send techs back to the site.
Have something to say about this story? Submit your own opinion piece, or quick word, to The Net.