The pre-Christmas timing of the release of NBN Co’s Special Access Undertaking proposals and the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission’s high-level guidance paper meant RSPs remained muted while they sifted through the details of both documents.

Andrew Sheridan, Optus VP of regulatory and public affairs said that “The ACCC’s paper is welcomed. It demonstrates that there has been progressing but it’s been slow going. The principles articulated are sensible and ones you would expect, but success will turn on the outcome in terms of the level of prices, price structure, and the mechanism to adjust these over time. So the real challenges lie ahead.”

He further added: “Price levels, for example, all depend on the efficient costs of the NBN, which industry and ACCC are yet to see and consult on.”

Meanwhile, a spokesperson for Telstra said that “The ACCC is running a thorough consultative process that considers the needs of the whole industry and our customers. We’ll need time to consider NBN Co’s response in detail. We look forward to this ACCC-led process delivering better outcomes for customers and a financially sustainable broadband market in Australia.”

On the other hand, a spokesperson for TPG said that “We welcome the ACCC’s paper and are pleased there is recognition that the existing SAU is problematic. We agree with the ACCC that a new regulatory model must provide cost certainty to retailers. The ever-increasing RSPs costs are unsustainable. While this paper demonstrates some progress, much of the work is ahead of us over the next 12 months and we look forward to that further engagement with the ACCC and industry.”

Optus, Telstra, and TPG are only some of the biggest RSPs that are expected to respond to the proposals and guidance papers released by NBN Co and the ACCC, respectively. Several other RSPs revealed that they are still trying to absorb the proposals but rest assured that they will respond in due course. This means that NBN Co and SAU will receive their response, perhaps as soon as the new year kicks in.

Meanwhile, NBN Co publicly previewed key concessions to retailers yesterday. This included charging for CVC based on usage and not forecasts. This meant that CVC was removed completely from higher speed plans. As a result, 25Mbps was set as the entry-level tier for service. This explicitly increased CVC inclusions in bundles on a twice-yearly basis.