Telstra boss Vicki Brady has faced pointed scrutiny over the company’s nationwide service failure, her executive pay packet and whether senior leaders should forgo bonuses, after cutting short a family holiday and landing back in Australia just hours earlier.
The disruption left millions of customers unable to place calls, use mobile internet or process electronic payments on Wednesday morning, following a technical fault linked to timers at Telstra data centres in Sydney and Melbourne.
Ms Brady was overseas with her family when Australia’s largest telecommunications provider was plunged into crisis, and had to be reached through Microsoft Teams because some colleagues were themselves caught up in the network breakdown.
Soon after arriving in Sydney on Friday morning, she appeared at a press conference alongside chief financial officer Michael Ackland, where she was pressed on her $6.7million remuneration and whether she accepted personal responsibility for the outage.
‘When it comes to accountability, I’m the CEO and so it absolutely starts with me,’ she said.
‘That will be part of what will be considered once we get through and make sure we understand exactly what happened here and what changes might need to be made, and our board will oversee that process.’
Ms Brady also used the media appearance to issue a direct apology for the widespread outage.
‘We have let our customers and Australians down and for that I am deeply sorry,’ she said.
Telstra chief executive Vicki Brady (pictured) addressed the media for the first time since the nationwide outage
‘I understand how much Australians rely on us to keep in touch, to work, and stay safe.
‘I also understand the broader impact on the community when services go down from things like payments to transport. It’s extremely frustrating.’
When the executives were asked if they would surrender their bonuses, Ms Brady said it was a decision for the board.
‘Our focus right now has been on getting the issues fixed, making sure all of our customers are back up and running, and then making sure we get the investigation done,’ she said.
‘We again have very clear processes and governance when it comes to bonuses and remuneration. That process will happen, and it will be overseen by our board.’
Ms Brady said she had booked the first flight home when she became aware of the outage, several hours after it began.
She told reporters she was initially unable to phone her colleague because his phone was not working and he had to contact her via Microsoft Teams.
‘I was able to get back in touch with him via Teams,’ she said.
Ms Brady was overseas when Telstra suffered the nationwide outage on Wednesday
Ms Brady has been in regular contact with Communications Minister Anika Wells since Wednesday and updated Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on Friday.
The outage threw public transport into chaos, with all regional train services across Victoria suspended and major rail lines in NSW disrupted by telecommunications faults.
About 300 Triple Zero calls were affected by the outage, amid concerns it may have contributed to a death in South Australia.
The circumstances surrounding the death are being investigated by police.
Telstra is assisting authorities in their investigations, including whether there is any connection to the outage.
‘Our thoughts are with the person’s family and loved ones at this incredibly difficult time,’ Mr Ackland said.
‘We’ve conducted a detailed review of our network records using the information provided to us, as well as a number of services associated with the same address.
‘To date, we can see no record of calls from those numbers accessing Telstra’s mobile network to call triple zero, and more broadly, no record of any calls from those numbers to the triple zero platform.’
More to come.
