Aussies impacted by Telstra nation-wide outage eligible for compensation - here's what you need to know

By ASHLEY NICKEL, NEWS REPORTER, AUSTRALIA Published: 11:23, 13 July 2026 | Updated: 11:24, 13 July 2026 Telstra customers affected by last week's widespread outage can apply for compensation from the telco. The national network shutdown last Wednesday left millions of Australians without mobile coverage and businesses without digital payment systems. Triple zero calls were also affected by the outage, with Telstra forced to follow up on more than 600 failed calls with welfare checks. Major transport infrastructure was impacted, including train services in NSW and Victoria, electric vehicle chargers run by Chargefox, taxis and Uber services. Telstra chief financial officer Michael Ackland on Monday said businesses that suffered financial loss from the outage could apply for compensation by making an online complaint to the official Telstra complaints webpage or through the app.  Applicants need to provide evidence of the loss.  'We require evidence to support your claim and will ask for you to provide this via a reply to that email,' Mr Ackland said. 'Providing a clear description of the impact, your estimated claim amount, and supporting documentation will help us assess your claim more efficiently. We may contact you by phone to discuss further evidence required or to clarify your claim.' Telstra chief financial officer Michael Ackland (above) on Monday invited business customers affected by last week's outage to apply for compensation The Telstra outage last Wednesday saw hundreds of businesses lose the ability to process digital payments Non-business Telstra customers affected by the outage were also invited to submit a complaint.  'We want to apologise again for the disruption these issues had on our customers and the broader community,' Mr Ackland said. 'We know how much you rely on our network – for work, for travel and to stay safe – and we take that responsibility very seriously.' Telstra has narrowed down the cause of the outage to a time synchronisation glitch. Most of the network was back online by the afternoon.  'It took a little longer for some business customers to fully restore their services and we worked with them closely until they were back online,' Mr Ackland said. 'As we resolved the original outage, we identified a subsequent issue affecting some calls, including to triple zero. 'In these cases, some people calling triple zero received an error message, and their phone would then try to connect to an alternative mobile network. 'By 12.30pm on July 9, we had implemented a solution that addressed the issue affecting some calls to triple zero.'