Kyneton residents may experience a series of temporary outages in mobile phone coverage this week as Telstra upgrades its mobile base station with additional infrastructure.
These improvements will impact Telstra 3G and 4G coverage at various times during daylight hours from Wednesday to Friday this week, and again on Monday and Tuesday of next week.
There will be no impact to services over the weekend or after 5pm on any day.
Telstra mobile customers may have already received text messages advising them of the upcoming work.
Landline services, NBN internet services and mobile coverage from other providers will not be impacted.
Any calls to Triple Zero from a Telstra mobile when the site is off air will automatically be diverted to any working mobile network for connection to emergency services.
Telstra’s regional general manager, Steve Tinker, said while crews needed to work during daylight for safety, they would only be switching off the site when it was needed and would have it back on as quickly as possible.
“Where possible we will just be switching off the parts of the tower we are working on, leaving the rest operational,” Mr Tinker said.
“While coverage and capacity will decline during this time, we want to keep the amount of time the site is off air to an absolute minimum.
“Telstra knows that this area suffers from congestion on the mobile network, which impacts speeds and user experience.
“After adding extra 4G and 5G coverage in 2020, this upgrade will be the next step in helping improve network capacity but we know that another base station is needed to make significant change,” he said.
Mr Tinker said Telstra was actively working with council to try to find another location that would meet the needs of both the community and also the technical requirements for a site.
“There’s never a good time to undertake this sort of work but once it is completed, it will mean better mobile services for local residents,” Mr Tinker said.
For mobile coverage in the interim, if residents have access to a wi-fi signal at home or at work, Telstra encourages them to activate wi-fi calling.
This is a free setting on most popular mobile phones and allows your mobile to use a wi-fi network to make and receive mobile calls.
“We know many businesses use the Telstra network for their point-of-sale terminals. However, Telstra does not operate the EFTPOS network; it is operated by financial institutions,” Mr Tinker said.
“Many terminals can also be connected using fixed-line or wi-fi/nbn internet connections if they are available within the retail premises.
“Retailers should contact their bank for more information on how to switch between these methods to ensure continuous service.”
