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This story highlights some of the terms and conditions surrounding the unbundled bitstream service (UBS) offered by Telecom as a method of dodging the local-loop unbundling bullet -- and it's not pretty.

In fact -- some of it is just plain ridiculous and will do little to encourage real competition in the broadband DSL marketplace.

Most stunningly, there's a significant punitive fee to be paid when a third-party provider convinces an existing Telecom DSL user to switch to a UBS-based service Yes, Telecom will charge a $150 penalty (nearly four times the retail monthly price of a JetSurf 1GB plan) for such defections.

Hopefully most will be smart enough to cancel their JetStream connection and then purchase the alternative supplier's UBS-delivered option rather than simply "switching" and thereby triggering the penalty.

No chance of ditching Telecom's voice-service and switching to VOIP using a UBS service either. The moment a customer relinquishes their Telecom voice service Telecom will refuse to provide UBS connectivity.

I'm not familiar enough with the rates ISPs are paying for international bandwidth or other services to properly judge whether the $25.50-$27.95 monthly UBS fee that Telecom plans to charge third-party providers -- but this part doesn't seem too bad to me.

In the case of an ISP looking to offer an alternative to the $40/month JetSurf 1GB plan, that leaves them up to $14 to cover all the regular ISP services plus that gigabyte of traffic.

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Unfortunately however, Telecom will be providing UBS on an uncommitted bandwidth basis and there are probably a few cynics who will suggest that UBS customers will get a lower allocation than Telecom's retail users. Similar charges were leveled when the ISP dialing prefix was introduced and many of Telecom's competitors alleged that their customers connections were being dropped before Xtra's.

Overall, if I were an ISP or other service provider, I don't think I'd be too chuffed with what Telecom is proposing.

In a truly competitive marketplace (such as the toll market), Telecom works hard to retain customers by offering agressive prices and high levels of service -- but in the DSL market it simply plonks on a penalty fee for switching suppliers. That speaks volumes doesn't it?

It should be pointed out of course, that this is a "discussion paper" and the final T&C may differ from those that are currently proposed.

I'd like to hear from any potential suppliers of service using the UBS and get their opinions of what's being mooted (confidentiality preserved of course).

Williamson Still Talking
I see that Maurice Williamson (National's IT inaction man) has just finished saying a lot about very little.

According (once again) to an IDG report, Williamson thinks that government departments should justify why they purchase products from overseas hardware or software suppliers.

Well last time I checked, such decisions were usually made on the basis of purchase cost, total cost of ownership, suitability for the task and ongoing support availability. Any IT manager who buys without full regard for the most prudent use of their budget commensurate with the most effective delivery of a solution is an idiot and shouldn't be in the role.

Williamson sounds like he's all in favour of adding another bit of bureaucracy to the role of IT management -- but it's also a waste of time because he goes on to say that [his] government wouldn't be interfering with such decisions.

"Do you want cabinet and the government to decide what software the public sector buys?" he is quoted as saying.

Williamson went on to cite the INCIS project as an example of bad decision-making.

Can someone remind me who the Minister for IT was during the INCIS debacle?

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