In a rather un-Christian act, Telstra has cut off a church's landline and they have been without it or an Internet service for more than two months.
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Parish of North Goulburn council chairman Stan O'Donnell has reached his wits end with the situation.
He said the problems all began on January 2 this year when the landline dropped out.
"The first I knew of it was an email I received at 4pm that [day] from Telstra advising that the telecommunication services at the St Nicholas Church Hall in Kinghorne Street had been disconnected," he said.
"These services comprised two landlines and an NBN Internet service.
"I had no prior notification this was going to happen. There was no justification and no reason and then they blamed us for it.
"They said we asked for it to be cancelled, which is not true. There was no correspondence between us and Telstra about it at all.
"We have paid our bills always on time; more than $5000 a year."
Mr O'Donnell said the church relied upon the services to reach out to parishioners.
"We need those services to be able to contact our sick and older parishioners. Most of them are on landlines," he said.
"And also just to conduct the business of the church."
He said he had been running church business from his own mobile phone and his Internet at home, but it was getting beyond his means.
"As the Rector's Warden, I carry out these duties until we get a new minister, which could take another seven months," he said.
"Apart from administration of the church, we have Telecare ladies who ring the disabled and ill parishioners and they are having to do this from their home phone numbers.
"They ring once a week to keep in contact and organise visits. It is very hard for them if there is no phone at the office."
The Goulburn Post put questions to Telstra about the situation.
Telstra regional general manager Ann Jakle said there appeared to have been some confusion with the address originally logged for the church and this was the reason behind the sudden disconnection of their services.
"I have personally conveyed my apologies to Stan O'Donnell at St Nicholas' Anglican Parish for the inconvenience caused by this connection confusion," Ms Jakle said.
"We are now working as fast as possible to reconnect the church's services.
"Interim, we have arranged for all landline calls to be diverted through to a mobile service.
"We have also ensured that there is an Internet device at the church."
David Cole
Journalist at the Goulburn Post
Journalist at the Goulburn Post
