Telstra’s response to the regional telecommunications report has been increased by $75 million, according to outgoing CEO Andy Penn.
Telstra has also pledged to increase the number of employees dedicated to serving regional and remote communities.
Penn promised “more boots on the ground in remote Australia” through Telstra’s expanded “connected communities” programme in a speech to the National Farmers Federation convention in Canberra.
Penn stated, “We will quadruple the number of locally based regional engagement managers to work with their communities to improve the customer experience, provide information about coverage, performance, and outage management, and build connectivity literacy and digital capacity.”
“To help our network work as hard as possible for our customers, we’ll treble the number of highly-experienced regional network advisors who will work with clients to address complicated network challenges.”
“For the first time, we’ll assign a remote community advocate who will be in charge of monitoring our network’s performance, communicating recovery times to impacted communities, and responding to their needs.”
Penn also pledged a further $75 million to Telstra’s response to the February regional telecoms review.
The funds will come from a portion of Telstra InfraCo’s towers business, as well as $200 million in four-year co-investment with the government and local communities.
By June 2025, the company plans to enhance regional 4G and 5G coverage by 100,000 square kilometres.
Telstra has also pledged $150 million to upgrade 180 3G sites, increase capacity at high-traffic 4G sites, and make other site improvements.
