Telecoms company escapes fine for repeated network failures

Thursday 21 November 2024

A telecoms provider that prevented islanders from calling emergency services for almost five hours last year has avoided a fine, after an investigation found that the company had already taken steps to prevent similar incidents occurring.

Between May and July last year, Sure Jersey suffered 18 separate network failures that left around half of its customers without service for almost five hours in total.

The outages led to an investigation by the Jersey Competition Regulatory Authority, which regulates telecoms providers in the island.

Although the watchdog described the frequency and duration of the outages as "serious concerns", it decided not to impose a fine after Sure made technical improvements to prevent future disruptions.

The JCRA also found that the disruptions could have theoretically prevented customers from making 999 calls – but confirmed there was no evidence that any emergency calls were affected.

Tim Ringsdore, CEO of the JCRA, said: "The Authority treats any incidents which impact emergency service calls with the utmost seriousness.

"Although no calls from the public were affected in this case, the frequency and duration of these incidents raised significant concerns."

He added: "In response to our investigation, Sure has since implemented several measures to enhance its response to network issues and committed to further improvements to prevent similar occurrences.

"Based on these actions, the Authority has decided not to take further action against Sure at this time."

The findings come after changes to the Telecommunications Law gave the JCRA broader powers and tougher sanctions to ensure that the communications networks and services that customers rely on operate properly.

The new regulations, approved by States Members in September, now allow fines of up to £10,000 per day for network failures.