It looks like lockdowns are pushing everyone onto faster NBN speeds

The household fight between parents at work and children learning online for bandwidth at Zoom meetings appears to be driving a shift to higher NBN speed plans for Australian homes.

The ACCC’s latest NBN Wholesale Market Indicators Report says around 400,000 residential broadband customers moved to higher speed plans in the June 2021 quarter, just as Melbourne merged from its fifth lockdown and Sydney began is now 13-week lockdown, which NSW premier Gladys Berejiklan announced would be extened until the end of September today.

Nearly three-quarters of all NBN wholesale connections are now at speeds of 50Mbps or above, including 17.3% at speeds of 100Mbps or above.

ACCC Commissioner Anna Brakey said NBN Co’s incentives for retail providers, such as its ‘Focus on Fast’ promotion, have been welcome as many Australians work and study from home.

“Most broadband customers are now using higher speed tiers and that is a result of more retail providers and NBN promoting higher speed plans,” she said.

“Retailers may revert to standard pricing for premium services once a promotion ends, and we urge customers to monitor their usage to make sure that their service meets their ongoing needs.”

Retail service providers acquired significantly more bandwidth over the June quarter, up 9.2% which resulted in total Connectivity Virtual Circuit (CVC) acquired per customer increasing from 2.54Mbps to 2.74Mbps.

The amount of bandwidth acquired is one of the key factors that impact customer experience.

“We are pleased that retail providers are acquiring additional capacity to support network demand and keep consumers connected,” Brakey said.

Wholesale market shares for the four main retail service providers remained fairly stable in the June quarter.

Among smaller retailers, Aussie Broadband continued to make strong gains and accounted for 26% of the wholesale services added in the quarter, lifting its market share to 4.7%.

You can read more on the NBN Wholesale Market Indicators here.