Many Australians have been venting their frustration at an outage of the country’s second largest telecommunications network, Optus.
The telco said a network fault had resulted in its mobile and fixed-line phone and internet services to be taken down, affecting tens of millions of services across Australia.
Optus has 10.2 million Australian customers, some of whom were camped out at public libraries, McDonald’s restaurants and shopping centres today in a bid to access the web – and for some – to complain about the outage.
The hashtag #OptusDown is now trending, with one X user dubbing the outage an “absolute failure” and others saying they are trying to cancel their plans.
One good Samaritan posted a picture of a parking queue, saying an Optus user couldn’t access his cards. Brad Tallon, a Telstra customer, hotspotted the driver so he could pay.
Good deed for the day - Optus user couldn't access on-line cards to pay parking - I hotspotted him through my Telstra connection on mobile to clear this backlog! Good way to help if you can today! #OptusOutage pic.twitter.com/yVwmJwPIlS
— Brad Tallon (@oz_bat) November 7, 2023
A Melbourne commuter said her frustration about the Melbourne trains being down was made even worse when she realised she couldn’t order an Uber because of the outage.
Have to go back home from Flinders St station, Melbourne due to no trains running atm. No bus replacement either. Can’t hire Uber ride as I’m on #Optus network. #optusoutage #Melbourne #Australia #nointernet pic.twitter.com/MvR9dapl4g
— Cher Canda (@CherCanda) November 7, 2023
One Optus customer called ABC radio to explain how her cat first notified her of the outage. When the cat’s wifi feeder – connected to Optus internet – failed to dispense its food, the cat was quick to notify its owner.
We want to hear how the Optus network threw out your day. What did you have to do to work around the outage? Were you forced to visit an ATM to take out cash to pay for your morning coffee? Did you miss an important phone call? Did you find yourself working from your local McDonald’s this morning? Were you also woken up at an ungodly hour by a hungry pet?
Share your thoughts and experiences in the comments below.
