Billing Information

1. Billing Runs and Payment Cycles
2. Bill Reprints
3. Bill and Payment Queries
4. Call Length and Usage Disputes
5. Itemised Billing
6. Financial Hardship

Billing Runs and Payment Cycles 

Each month we will send you a bill for the amount owing, including your access fee and all applicable fees and charges. The monthly bill will be sent by your choice at the time of application.

You are billed in advance for all services such as DSL monthly access fee and HomePhone Line Rental fee. All usage based charges are billed in arrears.

Your account is charged at the beginning of each month and is due payable 14 days after. If you have requested payment via credit card your monthly due invoice will be debited at the beginning of each month to your nominated credit card. If you have requested payment via Direct Debit, payment will automatically be debited from your account on the 15 th of each month.

Bill Reprints 

You can request a past copy of your invoice at anytime by calling our support number 1300 735 439. Any past invoices requested and sent are charged $2.50 per invoice.

Bill and Payment Queries 

We accept bill queries before the direct debit date of your bill. We will assume all call, usage and service charges are correct and accepted by you after the debit date has passed.

We will attempt to resolve your billing queries involving bill re-calculations within 5 working days from receipt of the query.

Call Length and Usage Disputes 

Call length and usage charges can be disputed or queried up to the due date of your bill. Once the due date has passed, we will assume the call charges to be correct and accepted by you.

In the event of a dispute, we will initiate an investigation with the service network. Investigations can take up to 4 weeks.

The service network will not investigate queries whereby you dispute that a call or usage was made from your service.

Where a dispute is upheld in your favour, we will issue a credit to your account in the next billing run.

Itemised Billing 

Unless we agree with you otherwise, your bill will itemise all calls and applicable charges for your service other than local calls made from your home phone service.

Local calls from your home phone will be summarized.

Financial Hardship

You may be experiencing Financial Hardship when you are unable to meet the financial obligations of your agreement with TADAust Connect for reasonable causes over a limited or long period of time.

Reasonable causes of financial hardship may include:

• Loss of employment
• Family breakdown or death in the family
• Illness, including physical incapacity, hospitalisation, or mental illness of the customer or family member
• Natural disasters

If you are experiencing financial hardship you may need assistance from us to change your payment and/or service arrangements so that your obligations to us can be met.

Customer Eligibility

If you are experiencing financial hardship, this policy may apply to you.

TADAust Connect will assess your claim for eligibility and will consider your individual circumstances as part of the assessment.

Please note that if you are simply experiencing temporary payment difficulty, this policy would not apply to you. Please call our Accounts Department on 1300 735 439 to discuss your situation.

How TADAust Connect can assist you

• TADAust Connect has representatives that can assist you with your Financial Hardship claim.
• You are able to contact our representatives between 9.00am to 5.00pm EST on 1300 735 439.
• We will assess your claim, discuss your payment and service options with you and aim to reach a reasonable outcome.
• In addition to contacting us, TADAust Connect urges you to engage the assistance of a financial counsellor. We are aware that there are sometimes waiting lists to see financial counsellors so in the interim you may be asked for documents to substantiate your claim.

Managing your claim

• We may ask you to submit evidence to us to support your claim. Please refer to the section in this policy that lists types of evidence that we may ask from you.
• We will take into account your circumstance and financial position to reach a financial arrangement that is suitable to both parties.
• Payment arrangements will be made with the view to cover any future use and reduce your debt.
• We may suggest that some or all of your services be restricted to prevent you falling further in debt whilst the arrangement is in place. We will attempt to contact you if this action becomes necessary and has not been discussed with you.
• We will send you written confirmation of the agreed arrangement if you request us to do so.
• We will attempt to contact you both by telephone and letter should the arrangement not be kept by you prior to taking further credit management action.
• If you require us to review your arrangement due to a change in your circumstance we will do so.
• Whilst your payment arrangement remains in place we will not report your debt to a Credit Reporting Agency.

Your responsibilities

• You must make the agreed payments on the agreed dates.
• You must show a willingness to reduce usage to a minimum during the term of the financial arrangement
• You will contact us within 48 hours of an agreed payment date if you are unable to keep your commitment.
• You will contact us to advise us if your circumstance has changed favourably or unfavourably during the term of the arrangement.
• You will act promptly and honestly at all times throughout the course of this arrangement.

Termination of the arrangement

• In the event the arrangement is not adhered to and we have not been contacted by you, we will take reasonable steps to contact you or your authorised representative before taking further action.
• The arrangement will be considered terminated after this time and full credit management action will resume.
• In the event that you choose to cancel your account with TADAust Connect, the arrangement will no longer be valid and normal credit management action will apply.
• Failure to make the agreed payments on a regular basis may be viewed negatively and result in termination of the arrangement.

Required documentation to support your claim

TADAust Connect may ask for any of the below types of evidence to support your claim of financial hardship:

• Statement of financial position
• Evidence that you have engaged a financial counsellor or evidence of a pending appointment to see a financial counsellor.
• Statutory Declaration from a person that is familiar with your situation. (Family Doctor, Clergy, Bank Officer, etc.)
• Medical certificates from treating specialist or other medical professionals.

Financial Counsellors

The contacts below may be of assistance to you for your state or territory:

• ACT
  Care Financial Counselling Service - 02 6257 1788
• New South Wales
  Credit and debt Hotline - 1800 808 488
• Northern Territory
  Anglicare Financial Counselling Service - 08 8948 2700
• Queensland
  Financial counsellors Association of Queensland - 07 3321 3192
• South Australia
  Uniting Care Wesley Adelaide - 08 8202 5180
• Tasmania
  Anglicare Financial Counselling Service - 1800 243 232
• Victoria
  Consumer Affairs Victoria - 1300 55 81 81
• Western Australia Financial Counsellors Resource Project - 08 9221 9411