Telstra Wholesale has announced a new NBN Transfer process to bring customers greater speed and flexibility, and to open up more opportunities to compete in the market.

As the nbn rollout gathers pace and more Australian homes and businesses choose their first nbn provider, resellers will increasingly need to target transfer business, instead of new nbn connections, to grow their market share.

Telstra Wholesale has announced a new NBN Transfer process that streamlines the way its Wholesale nbn customers deliver services. It allows more flexibility and less interruption and uses the LOLO™ platform with which Telstra Wholesale customers are already familiar.

“Prior to the implementation of the new NBN Transfer process, end customers were forced to cancel their nbn service and then fire up a new one,” says Craig McAinsh, National Churn Manager, Wholesale Customer Transfers at Telstra Wholesale.

“We saw very little uptake of that due to the disruption and costs involved – at an end user level, as well as to our wholesale customer base. The new process allows for transferring existing nbn services, along with a phone number port if it’s required, without having to go through all the hassle that we’ve seen in the past.”

“As nbn customers move out of migration mode in the coming years, a transfer between service providers is going to be the most common strategy between competing providers.”

- Craig McAinsh, Operations Manager, Telstra Wholesale

So what are the benefits wholesalers can expect to see?

A bigger market to approach

There are now over 1.6 million active consumer nbn connections. For Telstra Wholesale nbn customers, the new NBN Transfer process opens up a much bigger commercial market of potential end users who are already connected to the nbn, but may be keen to switch to a new service provider with a good commercial offering.

“As we move out of migration mode in the coming years, a transfer between service providers is going to be the most common strategy between competing providers,” says Craig.

“So while there’s a market of around half a million nbn connections that can be easily transferred now, that number will grow significantly over the short and medium term. For wholesalers that are able to develop a strong strategy to entice customers away from their current provider, there are huge gains to be had.”

Greater efficiency

At the core of the new upgrade is the ability for Telstra Wholesale nbn customers to transfer their end users far more efficiently than before. Small industry porting timelines still apply for telephone lines, but nbn service connections can be transferred in as little as a day – reducing the impact on end users.

More flexibility

The new NBN Transfer capability (which utilises Telstra Wholesale’s existing LOLO platform) will facilitate greater flexibility in what Telstra Wholesale customers can offer their customers over the nbn, according to Craig.

“Our customers will be used to our churn and broadband transfer processes, which have some limitations. In the NBN Transfer space, because all we are doing is shifting the infrastructure ownership between access-seekers, you can basically go from any product that was on a provider, to any product on the new provider.

“So you can go from a straight analogue voice on the nbn to a full bundle, or any combination and speed - whatever you like.”

More detail on the NBN Transfer process, including technical steps, service qualification and limitations on the kinds of services that can be transferred using this process can be found in our Broadband and Voice Operations Manual. We also communicate regularly with customers on technical aspects of the NBN Transfer process, so they can talk to their Service Manager to understand more.