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Provider overview
Important notice
The Prime Minister and the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts announced the Australian Broadband Guarantee on 7 March 2007. From April 2007, the Australian Broadband Guarantee will replace the Metropolitan Broadband Connect program and the Broadband Connect Incentive program. Read more about the Australian Broadband Guarantee.
If you are an Internet service provider (ISP) or wholesaler interested in registering under Metro Broadband Connect, you are advised to consult the Metro Broadband Connect final program guidelines – RTF or PDF version.
This overview should not be used as a substitute for the guidelines, which comprehensively set out the rules and requirements for the program.
For an explanation of capitalised terms, please refer to the glossary of terms.
Metro Broadband Connect services
Metro Broadband Connect Area
Incentive payments
Identifying customers
Existing customers
Premises eligibility
Claiming an incentive payment
Retailer-wholesaler arrangements
Applying for registration
Differences between Metro Broadband Connect and Broadband Connect?
Metro Broadband Connect and other Australian Government funding support programs
Metro Broadband Connect Services
A Metro Broadband Connect Service is a broadband service that meets the set criteria for price, performance and functionality.
ISPs who wish to apply to become a provider must seek to register, in each service area they nominate, at least:
- one threshold service, with a peak download data speed of at least 256 kbps and a peak upload speed of at least 64 kbps with a minimum monthly usage of at least 500 MB; and
- one added value service, with a peak download data speed of at least 512 kbps and a peak upload speed of at least 128 kbps with a minimum monthly usage of at least 1 GB,
ISPs may also register other added value services with additional functionality or features, which are also eligible for incentive payments.
The Metro Broadband Connect area covers:
- the capital cities of Adelaide , Brisbane , Canberra , Darwin , Hobart , Melbourne , Perth and Sydney ; and
- the Central Coast of NSW, Geelong , the Gold Coast including Tweed Heads, Newcastle , Palmerston and Wollongong .
There are two categories of incentive payments:
- standard, being $500 (including GST), payable for services registered as standard services; and
- high cost, being $1000 (including GST), payable for services registered as high cost services.
In the first instance, interested customers will contact ISPs that can provide them with a service. Customers must confirm they meet the customer eligibility requirements.
Customers in the Metro Broadband Connect area who were supplied with an equivalent service prior to 8 March 2006 will not attract an incentive payment.
If you are a Metro Broadband Connect provider and have pre-existing customers receiving a service comparable to the threshold service except in terms of pricing, you must offer them Metro Broadband Connect-compliant pricing. To assist you to do so, a customer transfer payment may be made available.
There are three ways for a Metro Broadband Connect provider to determine the eligibility of premises:
- You may ask your customers to confirm they have checked with other ISPs in their area, as identified on the online service locator (to be made available shortly)., and no other registered ISPs were able to supply an equivalent service or Metro Broadband Connect service. Premises identified as eligible through this process will be subject to regular checks by DCITA.
- You may submit claims for customers being supplied with a service directly to DCITA who will determine which of these services are being supplied to eligible premises. This will be determined by the service availability information you are required to supply at the time of registration, and needs updating on a regular basis.
You must include sufficient information to allow DCITA to determine the specific location of each customer's premises for the incentive payment being claimed. The required information will include the fixed line telephone number, the street address and the post code of the premises. - Customers who register on the demand register (to be made available shortly).. will be required to confirm they were unable to receive a Metro Broadband Connect service or equivalent service from any of the ISPs listed on the online service locator. As a consequence the locations of the customers listed on the demand register will be considered as being eligible premises.
Once your customers have confirmed they are an eligible and you have started supplying them with services you can electronically submit incentive payments claims.
You can submit claims on a monthly basis via Metro Broadband Connect Online, (to be made available shortly)., and be paid an incentive payment for each eligible customer supplied with a service.
Retailer-wholesaler arrangements
It is expected that registered providers intending to provide a Metro Broadband Connect service by reselling a wholesaler's service will come to an agreement with the wholesaler to share the incentive payment.
To be eligible to receive a proportion of the incentive payment, the wholesaler must also be registered under the program.
Where a wholesaler upgrades its infrastructure allowing a service to be supplied, but which results in a higher bandwidth service being supplied to eligible premises by an ISP who is not registered under the program, they will be entitled to claim a lower level of incentive payment than it would have received if the ISP had been registered. The payment is lower because the wholesaler cannot guarantee the service being supplied to the customer meets the program's criteria.
In these circumstances, the size of the incentive payment will be determined in accordance with Section 4.3.1 of program guidelines.
In making such a claim, the wholesaler will still need to provide sufficient information to allow it to determine the eligibility of the location of the customer's premises and that a higher bandwidth service is being delivered.
You can apply for registration by using the application forms which can be downloaded from Registration forms (to be made available shortly). or requested from DCITA.
If you are already a registered Broadband Connect provider, you may access a streamlined registration process. You should discuss this option with DCITA prior to preparing a streamlined application, as the decision to accept the lodgement of a streamlined application will be at the discretion of DCITA.
Differences between Metro Broadband Connect and Broadband Connect?
Metro Broadband Connect has a number of key objectives in common with Broadband Connect, including providing support for the development of an efficient and competitive market for the supply of broadband services, a technologically neutral approach to service provision and the efficient use of public funds by effectively targeting support to areas of need.
However, some elements of Metro Broadband Connect differ from the Broadband Connect approach to reflect differences between metropolitan and regional/rural broadband markets.
Under Metro Broadband Connect:
- registered providers can apply for upfront payments for deploying new infrastructure that enables services (standard cost only) to be provided;
- registered wholesalers may claim a partial incentive payment for connected by retailers not registered with Metro Broadband Connect;
- registered providers' commercial plans to extend their network will be taken into account;
- registered providers must register both a mandated threshold service and a mandated added value service;
- premises built after the 8 March 2006 will generally be ineligible for incentive payments because it is expected they will be serviced with infrastructure that can supply equivalent services;
- high cost services can only be supplied to customers who have been registered on the demand register for six months or longer; and
- providers who are already registered with Broadband Connect may be able to access a streamlined process to register with Metro Broadband Connect.
Metro Broadband Connect and other Australian Government funding support programs
Metro Broadband Connect forms part of the Government's $1.1 billion Connect Australia package, which supports new broadband infrastructure and services, new regional clever networks, mobile services and Indigenous communications.
Connect Australia builds on the $242 million of funding already provided through the National Broadband Strategy, which was developed in response to the Regional Telecommunications Inquiry and the Government's Broadband Advisory Group.
Premises and/or customers that have previously received assistance to obtain a data service under other Government support programs are only eligible to receive a Metro Broadband Connect Service if DCITA is satisfied that the data service provided under the other Government support program is not comparable to a Metro Broadband Connect Service. Programs will be considered on a case by case basis.
Back to Metro Broadband Connect