BigPond is an Australian Internet service provider and is a subsidiary of Telstra. BigPond is Australia's largest ISP, and as a subsidiary of Telstra, has a majority share of internet penetration in Australia, primarily due to Telstra owning most telephone exchanges. Based in Melbourne, BigPond is now a nationwide company, providing access to internet services across the country.

Internet

• Cable - BigPond is Australia's largest provider of cable internet, which covers parts of Australia's main cities (Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Sydney, Adelaide and the Gold Coast). Speeds available are 'Standard' speeds (8 Mbit/s down/128kbit/s up) and 'Extreme' speeds (30Mbit/s down/1 Mbit/s). In the PC Authority Survey, Bigpond consistently received the lowest or close to lowest ratings for service and customer satisfaction in 2006, 2007, 2008. see http://www.pcauthority.com.au/Awards2008/bestisp.aspx

• ADSL - BigPond provides both ADSL and ADSL2+ services where available, with speeds ranging from 256 kbit/s down/64 kbit/s up to 20 Mbit/s down/1 Mbit/s up. The current speeds available on ADSL plans that BigPond offers are 1.5 Mbit/s down/256 kbit/s up, 8 Mbit/s down/384 kbit/s up and "up to" 20 Mbit/s down/1 Mbit/s up.

Naked DSL A four- to six-week trial of two kinds of naked DSL to "assess customer demand" was launched on 1st June 2010 'Pure DSL' having the ability to receive incoming calls and make emergency calls, and 'Naked DSL' being offered without a dial tone. "Telstra BigPond trials naked DSL". Ben Grubb, ZDNet.com.au. 2010-06-02. http://www.zdnet.com.au/telstra-bigpond-trials-naked-dsl-339303582.htm. Retrieved 2010-06-02. 

• Wireless - Through Telstra's Next G network, Bigpond provides the largest wireless network coverage in Australia, reaching 99% of the population.^[1] Download speeds range from 256 kbit/s to 3.5 Mbit/s in regional and interurban areas, and up to 7 Mbit/s in metropolitan and city areas. Currently the network has a maximum speed capability of 21 Mbit/s, although typical speeds vary from 256Kb/s - 3.6Mb/s. BigPond also provides wireless 'hot spots'.^[2]

• Satellite - Bigpond provides Satellite internet mainly for regional customers who are too far away from the exchange to get ADSL, and can not get Cable. Satellite comes in two forms - 1 way Satellite and 2 way Satellite. From 30 November 2008, BigPond is no longer providing 1 way Satellite.^[3] Speeds on BigPond Satellite range from 256 kbit/s down/64 kbit/s up to 800 kbit/s down/128 kbit/s up.^[4]

• Dialup - BigPond has moved customers off dialup to a broadband platform, and in 2006 its broadband customers surpassed the number of dialup customers.

Recent developments

Cable speed upgrades

On the 10th of March 2009 Telstra announced that they would be upgrading their HFC cable network to allow for peak speeds of 100Mbit/s. Melbourne is the first of five cities to receive the upgrade which was due to be completed by Christmas. The upgrade will take peak download speeds from 17 - 30Mbit/s to 100Mbit/s and will be achieved by changing to the DOCSIS 3.0 standard. The Ultimate Broadband service launched on December 1, 2009 and is available in Melbourne, offering download speeds of 100Mbit/s.^[5] Telstra CEO, Sol Trujillo, said that the network will be "capable of speeds of up to 200Mbit/s" after further upgrades in the future.^[6]

Customer Service

In 2007 a survey of 14,000 people by PC Authority magazine found Bigpond users rated poorly for customer service, and less than a third considered their service value for money. However, Bigpond argued that the survey's structure had encouraged people to provide extreme opinions.^[7]

The Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman (TIO) reported 14,692 complaints against Telstra Bigpond for the period 1 January 2009 - 31 March 2009.^[8] This reflected 47.5% of all complaints against all internet service providers reported to the TIO in Australia in that period. Customer Service, Complaints Handling, Faults & Provision accounted for 8,103 complaints in that period.

Bigpond uses offshore call centres to provide most of their technical support. The Technical Support 133933 number connects through an VOIP line to support staff mostly based in The Philippines.^[9] Technical Support officers have limited ability to resolve issues and cannot refer any issue to a Complaint Handling Officer or Customer Advocate. If the support call relates to network issues the Technical Support team cannot take any action to resolve the problem.^{[citation needed]}

Telstra Bigpond representatives have a series number for identification - a letter followed by 6 numerals and are not required to give this out.^{[citation needed]}

In November 2009 Telstra chief David Thodey promised a "new Telstra" which will be much more responsive to its customers in a bid to improve the telco's corporate reputation, stating that the new mantra at Telstra would be "customer service, customer service, customer service", and announcing increases in speed and data allowances for Bigpond customers.^[10]

The promise that David Thodey said about a "New Telstra" was the same as before the promise.

Services

BigPond Movies

Allows Australian residents to rent DVDs online, which are then mailed to the customers house. More recently, BigPond introduced the ability to buy movies online, which can be downloaded and played on their computer for a certain amount of time (usually 48 hours). BigPond members get a discount on the price of each movie.

BigPond Music

BigPond Music has a catalogue of high-quality (either 256 or 320 kbps) MP3 files available for purchase from a number of record labels. Tracks typically cost between $1.50 and $2.05, with the top ten downloaded tracks available for 15% off their usual price. BigPond members receive a further discount on the price of each album or track. Occasionally, BigPond Music makes a track available for free[2].

The Pond in Second Life

Telstra BigPond owned and operated a number of virtual islands in the online game Second Life ^[11] for approximately two years. Use of the eleven BigPond islands was unmetered for Telstra BigPond customers.^[12] Bigpond closed its Second Life presence in December 2009.^[13]

BigPond Games and GameArena

GameArena is the name of BigPond's free online games service, previously known as Wireplay. The service is managed by Mammoth Media and based on the east coast of Australia. Use of the file library, public servers and booking service is freely available to anyone, but provides specific advantages to Telstra customers such as preference in downloads and unmetered usage, as well as various bonuses in competitions. In order to gain access to a majority of game servers, the client The Arena, must be installed to connect through the firewall. This means that GameArena administrators can ensure troublemakers are consistently dealt with.^[14]

The site provides news, downloads and servers primarily for the PC, and Mac, though it has recently also branched out to include console sites. GameArena also provides an online game shop GameNow, which again sports various benefits to BigPond customers.^[15] GameArena recently went through a new shift with the merging of GameNow and Gameshop into itself. The new name is simply BigPond GameArena.^[16]

GameArena currently operates over 100 gaming servers, which are monitored by a volunteer force of administrators, known as GameOps. GameCreate is a service offered free of charge where users may book a server for a specific game for a 2 hour period of time. This server is private and can be used for either ladder training or social events.^[17]

Bigpond Security

Bigpond Security, BigPond's re-branded distribution of Authentium's ESP Desktop Security Suite, is a security suite that includes an email spam filter, email virus filter, content filter, desktop anti-virus, personal firewall, anti-spyware, anti-phishing and privacy protection. It is designed to be set and forget. The program is also unmetered for existing Bigpond customers, meaning it does not count towards their download limit when the program is downloaded. Software updates are also unmetered, however definition updates are metered but will not exceed 15mb per month.

References

External links

• BigPond official site
• BigPond Music