New ACCC guidance points to modem bottleneck ahead of September speed upgrades

Dylan Crismale - Digital Content Editor

Last updated 07 July 2025

The ACCC's updated Industry Guidance requires retailers to inform consumers that customer premises’ equipment and in-home setup may affect the speeds they receive, and to fairly represent the capabilities of different broadband speeds in their offerings.

It suggested NBN providers could communicate the impact of modem choice to customers with a statement like "Your choice of modem/router and how you set it up within your premises could limit you from utilising the maximum speed of your broadband plan".

This has become a concern given the September speed upgrades, which will see NBN 100 plans upgraded to 500Mbps for some premises. While newer networking equipment won’t have a problem with those kinds of speeds, older hardware utilising WiFi 4 may not be capable of delivering the speeds promised by the upgraded speed tiers.

Optus, for example, has already added a disclaimer to its new range of NBN plans. Plans eligible for speed tiers getting an upgrade in September have this fine print: "Actual speeds may vary and are limited by plan speed. Your modem and in-home setup may limit your speeds.”

The ACCC also suggested that industry could work together to create a single public register of modems and routers that are capable of supporting higher speeds.

Regarding confusion around the use of different speed tiers, the ACCC deferred to the NBN Co, which intends to update its website to better describe the capabilities of the various speed tiers.

During the consultation phase ahead of the updated guidance, NBN providers cited concerns that they won’t be able to provide customers with information about typical evening speeds that can be achieved in the near term once accelerated NBN speeds are adopted. The ACCC requires typical evening speeds to be disclosed in marketing materials.

The ACCC recommended that NBN providers take a conservative approach to marketing speeds until they could be confirmed, including using a clear and prominent holding statement. However, it also urged that NBN providers should provide typical evening speed figures as soon as they’re available.

The onus is now on NBN providers to adopt the new Industry Guidance. The consultation process drew additional questions from NBN providers that fall outside of the scope of the ACCC.

These included concerns that NBN Co publishes maximum wholesale speeds without qualifying these speeds as “maximum theoretical speeds” and concerns that some NBN providers are throttling the performance of modems and routers supplied to consumers, which prevents users from accessing higher speeds with other NBN providers when they leave. The ACCC will engage further on both issues.

Telstra, TPG Telecom, Vocus (Dodo and iPrimus), Aussie Broadband, Leaptel, NBN Co itself, and the Australian Communications Consumer Action Network (ACCAN) provided submissions to the ACCC.

Dylan Crismale

Digital Content Editor

Dylan Crismale is a Digital Content Editor at WhistleOut, has been writing for almost a decade across a variety of Australian publications. He previously worked as a writer at Finder covering energy, internet and mobile plans. Dylan is passionate about finding the best deals to save people money and educating people about tech. When he's not sat at his desk Dylan loves working out, bingeing TV and hanging out with friends.

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