Dear Customers and Partners,
As a further update to the ongoing carrier capacity issues, we advise of the following developments including that any remaining congestion is limited to Telstra interconnects in Sydney only.

Melbourne
Following capacity upgrades, we can confirm that no congestion was experienced in Melbourne on Friday onwards. We are continuing to monitor the situation and will advise of any changes.

Sydney
We have observed little to no congestion in Sydney today as a result of Telstra switching traffic to other call collection areas.
Works are being expedited to perform further capacity upgrades in Sydney. Capacity issues in this region are still expected during peak times. Although these works are being treated as a matter of urgency, no ETA has been provided at this stage.

All Other Areas
As per our previous update, no other areas are known to be affected by any ongoing capacity issues.

We thank you for your continued understanding and patience. Further updates will be provided as soon as they are available.

Receiving too many notifications? Use the Manage your Subscription link below.

Kind Regards,
The MaxoTel Team

Dear Customers and Partners,

We have received a further progress update on capacity upgrades being undertaken to decrease and mitigate congestion at peak times on the inter-carrier links.

Currently, all capacity issues to every carrier network other than Telstra have been mitigated. Works are ongoing with Telstra to increase capacity on a per-region basis.

Please note that while other areas and carriers are no longer experiencing capacity issues on our upstream carriers interconnects, there are still other active reported issues on Telstra, Optus and other carriers networks. This means that you may still experience issues calling to or from other numbers, even those in areas which our carriers capacity issues have been resolved.

Status updates for Telstra capacity increases by region are detailed below…

Telstra, Melbourne

• Telstra Exchange, Windsor: Pre-patch complete, awaiting Telstra to provision the capacity. These works are being expedited. No further update on this.
• Telstra Exchange, Lonsdale: Pre-patch works were brought forward and were completed over the weekend. The carrier is now working with Telstra to have the approval processes expedited.

Telstra, Sydney
There was a planned upgrade initially scheduled to take place later in the year. The initial design work is being completed before contractors can be engaged to commence pre-patching. Dates for these works will be provided as soon as they are available.

Telstra, Tasmania
Additional capacity for a further 250 channels is now active in Launceston. Some congestion may still occur, as works are continuing for a further 520 channels to be completed by COB tomorrow (25/3).

Telstra, Adelaide
The carrier is working closely with Telstra to add additional capacity. Tie Cables are ready, pending further works. Further updates to be provided as soon as possible.

We thank you for your continued understanding and patience as we work to resolve these issues as quickly as possible. Further updates will be provided as soon as information becomes available.

Kind Regards,
The MaxoTel Team

Dear Customers and Partners,

Please be advised that we have been notified of a number of widespread outages affecting other carrier networks. Please note that these issues are in addition to the ongoing capacity issues.

Telstra have acknowledged congestion on their network impacting a small number of calls on Telstra phone services.

Optus is also reporting issues with customers making calls to both landline and mobile services. In our testing, it appears that Optus to Optus calls are working, but calls from Optus to other carriers are intermittent.

As a result of these further outages, MaxoTel customers may experience issues in calling to or from these networks.

We are continuing to monitor the situation and will advise as soon as further information becomes available.

Kind Regards,
The MaxoTel Team

Dear Customers and Partners,

This morning we have seen an unprecedented surge in call volumes, higher even than those experienced last week. This spike is likely in the wake of recent government announcements regarding the ongoing COVID-19 situation.

At this stage, we are seeing similar issues to those experienced last week, however, now the issue is impacting nationally, not just in NSW and VIC. In our testing, we have confirmed QLD and WA are affected as well.

The MaxoTel team is working diligently to minimise the impact of this issue, however, capacity issues are impacting the phone network at large, and the majority of the congestion is external to our network.

Further updates will follow as soon as more information is available.

Kind Regards,
The MaxoTel Team

Dear Customers and Partners,

At this time, the only remaining points of congestion are calls originating from Telstra services in Sydney and Melbourne. Congestion issues to all other carriers and locations have been resolved.

Melbourne: Pre-patch work has been completed for the capacity upgrade. We are awaiting Telstra to provision additional capacity to complete this upgrade. Unfortunately to ETA is available at this time.

Sydney: Additional works are ongoing, with patching works scheduled for 24th of March to progress the capacity upgrade to Sydney.

As weekend call volumes are typically much lower, we don’t anticipate any congestion issues over the weekend. At this stage, we are expecting to see some congestion to resume on Monday morning, specifically from Telstra services in Sydney and Melbourne.

We thank you for your continued understanding and patience as we work with our carriers to resolve this issue. We are continuing to implement any and all solutions possible to alleviate the impact of this issue, and work towards a full resolution.

Kind Regards,
The MaxoTel Team

Dear Customers and Partners,

Our carrier has been advised that congestion issues in Newcastle and Hobart have now been alleviated. Our testing confirms that we are currently seeing no congestion in these areas.

We are continuing to monitor the situation and adapt traffic and routes wherever possible to alleviate congestion. Further works are continuing to increase capacity with Telstra and other carriers in other regions to further reduce the impact of this national issue.

We will provide further updates as soon as information becomes available. We thank you for your continued understanding and patience.

Kind Regards,
The MaxoTel Team

Dear Customers and Partners,

Following on from the issues experienced yesterday, while the issue has been largely mitigated, we can confirm that we are still seeing a number of inbound calls experiencing congestion issues this morning.

While the impact has been significantly reduced, a percentage of inbound calls destined for NSW and VIC numbers on our network are receiving a congestion message, primarily affecting calls originating from the Telstra network.

We have received a further update from the carrier confirming that the unprecedented increase in inbound call traffic has been directly attributed to the current pandemic. These external factors affect the phone network as a whole and are causing service disruptions across a number of carriers and providers around the country.

The following direct actions have been taken to mitigate the impact of the issue…

Yesterday before 3PM, additional capacity was implemented with a new carrier, which enabled us to resolve the outbound calling issue by sourcing diverse outbound channels and work around carrier-specific congestion.

Yesterday afternoon, capacity to the Optus network was increased and call distribution was improved. As of this morning, in our testing, we are seeing very few congested calls inbound to our network from the Optus network.

Last night between 11PM and 2AM (AEST), additional capacity to the Vodafone network was implemented under an urgent change request. In our testing this morning, we are seeing around 10% congestion from the Vodafone network.

There are ongoing efforts to increase capacity to the AAPT network, with the matter being escalated to their executive management team in order to expedite the process.

There are also ongoing efforts with Telstra, seeking to both increase capacity from their network, as well as improve call distribution to mitigate the impact of the issue. Unfortunately, we are still seeing a significant number of congested calls on the Telstra network.

We thank you for your continued understanding and patience throughout these service interruptions. We are doing all that we can to ensure the impact is minimised, as we work towards complete mitigation of and protection against these kinds of issues in future. We will provide further updates as soon as information becomes available.

Kind Regards,
The MaxoTel Team

Dear Customers and Partners,

The affected upstream carrier has advised that they have implemented a number of measures throughout the day to alleviate the intermittent inbound calling issue.

Further works are ongoing, and they have advised us that these measures will alleviate the congestion issue during peak periods. Works are underway for capacity increases across the network, being implemented as a matter of priority.

MaxoTel has established a number of solutions to minimise the impact of these issues throughout the day today, including establishing capacity with an additional carrier, giving us more options and alternatives to route around both this issue, as well as any others that may arise.

MaxoTel will continue to monitor the situation with the affected carrier, while we work to minimise the impact of any capacity issues to our customers. The carrier has committed to providing us with a further update by 11 AM AEST tomorrow, which we will promptly relay as soon as we receive it.

This is a widespread issue, affecting many telecommunications companies across the country. We thank you for your understanding, patience and continued support as we work diligently towards a resolution.

Kind Regards,
The MaxoTel Team