ACCC will allow you to do a NBN Speed Comparison and Test

Ever have trouble figuring out your true NBN Speeds? Suspect that the results you are getting on online tests are not 100% accurate? Well, things are soon to change for the better. Recently, The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has announced that it will now be receiving funding from the Federal Government for a brand new monitoring program which will assist in collating independent information about our very own Australian broadband speeds. It is assumed that this new project has been specially designed to oversee the performance of the NBN, and will assist ACCC in determining if speed issues are being caused by either the network or an ISP which has not purchased sufficient capacity for its users. All this data that will be collected will be released to the public in the later half of 2017.

It is no surprise that customer demands for high data speeds and data-intensive services require them access to accurate information in order to help customers choose the most appropriate NBN plan for their households or businesses. The transparency that this project will bring to users will be a huge milestone in giving consumers the ability to exercise choice as the next generation of services, including the NBN, is rolled out.

This particular field of monitoring is now a necessity due to how providers purchase access to the NBN. While providers are in essence, re-selling access to the same network, they also have to purchase capacity on said network, also known as Connectivity Virtual Circuit. At this very moment, telcos fork out about $16 a month per Mbps of capacity. However, from mid-year onward, NBN will be launching a new pricing scheme that could pull these numbers down to as little as $8 per Mbps.

However, the main issue with this is that should you look at a provider such as Telstra which charges around $100 for a 100Mbps or Tier 5 NBN connection, the ISP would  have to spend about $800 a month in order to be able to facilitate your service, excluding other various costs associated with providing access to the NBN. Obviously, Telstra is not actually spending $800 per customer, and as such, should too many Telstra users be using the internet at the same time, speeds are going to suffer for each of them, and they will not be getting the service they have paid for.

In order to make services affordable, ISPs and telcos need to find the perfect balance between how much they charge and the amount of CVC purchased. Too little CVC and customers will have an awful experience with snail speeds during peak hours. Purchase too much CVC, and the company will not be making money selling your plan or be able to keep up with competitive pricings from rival companies.

With the myriad of ISPs who are now connected to the NBN, it is expected that the ACCC's performance data should be extremely useful. After all, there' is nothing worse than being tied down to a lock in contract with a service that is disappointing you and just not performing in accordance with your standards. Thankfully, the ACCC plans to commence testing in this month. The project will involve installing testing hardware in more than 4,000 locations in order to determine typical speeds of fixed-line NBN services at various times throughout the day.