Australia’s NBN formally warned, discriminating between RSPs

NBN Co, the company overseeing the construction and management of Australia’s National Broadband Network (NBN), has been formally warned for discriminating between retail service providers (RSPs) with relation to the supply of upgraded NBN infrastructure to business customers. According to the ACCC, it had determined that from at least January 2018 NBN Co offered materially different commercial terms to different RSPs as it upgraded NBN infrastructure to support high speed, business-grade services. Further, the regulator also claimed that it had provided one RSP with indicative pricing information for its new Enterprise Ethernet service months before it gave the same information to other RSPs. Following the ACCC’s investigation, NBN Co was said to have admitted that it did not have appropriate processes in place to ensure it was complying with its transparency and non-discrimination obligations. As part of the court-enforceable undertaking, the firm has reportedly committed to offering consistent contract terms to RSPs for the supply of upgraded NBN infrastructure.