Quin says the monthly price increases of between $2.50 and $4.25 meant that Spark would only partially recover increases in wholesale charges.
Acknowledging that the Commission’s decision on the new charges was a draft and was unlikely to be finalised until sometime next year, Quin notes that Chorus was arguing for the new wholesale charges to be backdated.
“Given this negative uncertainty, Spark has no choice but to change its prices now,” he adds.
“If the Commerce Commission confirms these charges and decides to backdate its final decision, then the price increases we’re announcing today will not fully cover our increased wholesale costs.
"Once we have a clearer view on the final decision on wholesale charges and whether these charges will be backdated, we will review the situation – and we will do the right thing by our customers.”
Unlimited Broadband Data price reduction
Quin says Spark was also taking this opportunity to "simplify and streamline" its broadband plans.
From 1 February, the telco will drop the price of its Unlimited Broadband Data and homephone packages by $10,1 and remove the sale of the 150GB and 500GB data plans to new customers (since these would be priced on par with or above the Unlimited plan).
“The Unlimited data plans have been a great success and we want to make them even more attractive to customers," he adds.
"As we haven’t yet used traffic management on this plan, and will not be doing so in the near future, we have also decided to remove the traffic management policy from the Unlimited Broadband Data plans."
