Number of homes in NBN limbo balloons
More than doubles in just six months.NBN Co has added more than 19,000 premises to its footprint over the past fortnight that are unable to connect to internet services, underlining its new strategy to skip homes that are too hard to connect until later in the rollout.
The network builder has more than doubled the number of so-called “service class zero” or equivalent premises in its footprint in just six months.
Premises in ready-for-service areas that are unable to connect are categorised as SC0 for FTTP, SC10 for FTTN/B, and SC20 for HFC.
In the week ending November 17 last year, there were 61,852 SC0 premises; as of this week that figure had climbed to 145,658.
Over the same period, the size of the brownfields rollout has not doubled accordingly; it has grown from 2,281,136 to 3,645,868 premises, meaning the growth rate in SC0 premises is much higher than the number of new premises being added to the rollout.
This is important because it’s a metric NBN Co relies on to counter the incidence of problems elsewhere in the rollout, such as complaints filed with the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman (TIO).
Although raw complaint numbers continue to rise, “the rate of increase in these complaints is slower than the rate of new premises connected to the national broadband network”, NBN Co has repeatedly claimed.
The same cannot be said for SC0 premises.
The past fortnight has been particularly troublesome, with 16.5 percent of the 115,393 properties added to the rollout placed into the too-hard basket.
The disaster rolls on. When they come back (assuming they do intend to come back) to fix these problem premises just how much is this going to add to the $60Bn cost?
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