Breaking Lease on a House We Moved into a Week Ago (Due to Internet)

JustASmoothSkin on 30/01/2019 - 00:55
Last edited 02/02/2019 - 23:56 by 1 other user

Hi

Just moved into my nice new rental a week ago, This is my first house with my name on the lease and it is pretty much perfect for the family.

But I did say pretty much, Before I moved in I did my due diligence and looked at all the providers in the area for the essentials (Gas/Water/Electricity/Internet) and it all looked good, FTTP to the premises. Perfect should be able to watch movies and game on whatever provider I can get. Well turns out I don't have a choice for the provider as I am stuck in a "Telstra Smart Community" Which means the FTTP I was happy to have is, in fact, Telstra's "Velocity" network.

Maximum speeds on Telstra's Velocity network is (30Mbps/1Mbps)There is no speed boosts available due to "Congestion", I thought "Well I will try to make it work, Surely it can't be that bad?" Jokes on me because it is much much worse.

Here is the story on trying to pay for a service from Telstra (You can skip all this if you want)

So on the 24/01/19 the day after moving in I rang Telstra after talking to NBN and Internode hoping that I can use something other than Velocity (I have had a lot of poor experiences with Telstra as an ISP). After signing up to there "Unlimited Velocity Plan" which included buying a mandatory modem (that I don't need) that costs $240, paying for a connection fee of $99 and having a mandatory home line connection setup that will cost $10 per month (and I will never use). I was told that it would all be working the next day and that I can plug any modem into the wall and use my credentials to use the network.

Well it didn't work, and for the last 4 days I was strung around on "It should be working," "Your modem is broken," "Backend is having trouble with passwords," "Your order is in provisioning and won't be available till your new modem arrives," and that brings me to today.

My modem arrived this morning around 9 AM, after hooking it up and still getting nothing I called them and they reset my password (Again) and told me to wait an hour. I waited 10 hours, I called them up and once again they reset my password (For like the 5th time) and told me to wait till the morning. Well, I called them up straight away again, This time actually getting a little bit of help and we managed to get it running. "Yay, I can finally use the internet that I have been paying for a week" Booted up Overwatch, Joined a game and was instantly disconnected from the server. Ran a speed test and was like "well 5ms ping is good, Download speed exceeds what was advertised (32Mbps)" and then upload failed, Socket error, I re-ran the test about a dozen times then finally got a number for upload speed 0.09Mbps.

I rang up Telstra again and was told, "Your internet is fine" "Your modem is broken" "Upload speed doesn't affect games". Apparently he will talk to "level 2" tomorrow and they will call me if there is a problem.

So my question is, I am seriously reconsidering my move here. A solid connection to the internet is pretty much integral to this family. I like to play online games and stream with my friends when I come back from my FIFO work, Mum likes to watch her movies to wind down later in the day and use Skype to talk to family. The kids like Youtube, Online gaming and are just constantly downloading something. The upload speeds are so bad that a good portion of what we use the internet for is impossible,

Is there a way I can break the lease, Like a 30 day (teething) window.

Home & Garden Lease

Comments

  • Quantumcat on 30/01/2019 - 01:04
    +3

    You can break it but you'll probably have to pay rent until they find someone. You'll also be risking a bad reference, making it harder to rent in future. Read your lease.

    In my last place it took me six months to even get a phone line installed and have the internet working, and even then we only got max 60kbps (sub dial up). Unfortunately internet is a bit of a gamble and you can never really guarantee what you can get until you actually move in and try to connect it.

  • o53djz7qTPY4der on 30/01/2019 - 06:05
    +7

    30/1 isn't terrible. I mean it could be much worse. Your gripe is with Telstra not the REA or the owner of the property. You'll have to take a financial hit to break the lease, the landlord doesn't have to allow you to break it for free because you think the internet is too slow.

    • JustASmoothSkin on 30/01/2019 - 12:56

      The problem is it’s 30/.09, if it was 1mbps upload I could make this work.

  • elgrande on 30/01/2019 - 06:34

    You can break it, but it will cost you $$.

  • bobbified on 30/01/2019 - 07:09
    +7

    Is there a way I can break the lease…

    If you moved in a week ago, didn't you only just sign the lease agreement?
    Did you read it before you signed it? It tells you what to do and what the costs are to break the lease.

    • boomramada on 30/01/2019 - 13:23
      +1

      That's what Ozb legal team is for.

  • swapsey on 30/01/2019 - 08:10
    +1

    Imagine the pickle you'd be in if you bought the house ;-)

  • dasher86 on 30/01/2019 - 08:25
    +2

    If you're in an Optus 4 g network area get a secondary 4g internet plan. $60pm might be cheaper than the break lease cost.

    • [Deactivated] on 30/01/2019 - 09:46

      Probably actually the best advice, since cannot break lease without penalty/costs.
      And since issue seems to be with everyone using at once, OP cannot upload stream of his gaming.
      So just add some extra internet such as 4g internet plan, and maybe OP can take over exclusive use of one of the internet connections, when he needs upload bandwidth for streaming gaming.
      $60 per month, vs the cost of moving, cost of paying out lease until new tenant is found, hassle of finding a new place, if there even is another suitable place available for rent (and then you have to be chosen over other rental applicants). Wayyyyy too much cost and hassles, if adding another connection for $60/month will solve issue.

      kids always downloading something

      Maybe have them downloading overnight. If it torrent downloading, I think you can set it up to add torrents, but then only do the actual downloads overnight or late night, whenever nobody is using it.

      • lgacb08 on 02/02/2019 - 23:51

        your kidding me, I'm with optus 4g now and apart from the first month honeymoon period, more than half a week I have constant drop out from them at night, so bad that even the google home devices had to drop wifi connection and release their own wifi service.

  • shaybisc on 30/01/2019 - 09:08
    +1

    If it's that important to you maybe your "due diligence" should including asking the neighbours about their internet speed.

  • altomic on 30/01/2019 - 09:13
    +1

    Yes, you can break the lease.

    Under the Commonwealth Rental & Communications Act (2008) Section 48, subsection 5 - " A Tenant may cease a rental agreement with 28 days of the lease without any Financial Penalty should they have elevated and unrealistic expectations"

    • try2bhelpful on 30/01/2019 - 09:21

      Not sure if that would apply to the Internet speeds though; unless the person renting the property said that the Internet access was really good. Perhaps worth talking to the rental people - they might let you out of the lease to be rid of you. However, you can't guarantee the next place you rent won't have the same issues. The NBN, and the providers, are a lottery.

      • HighAndDry on 30/01/2019 - 09:27
        +2

        Pretty sure that's a whoosh.

        • try2bhelpful on 30/01/2019 - 09:35
          +1

          got to stop taking these things at face value. I think you are correct. I did wonder about "elevated and unrealistic expectations". But my point still remains that even if the OP manages to break the lease the next house might have the same issues.

          • HighAndDry on 30/01/2019 - 09:37

            @try2bhelpful: Altomic did go the extra mile to make it look halfway legit. Other than the "elevated and unrealistic expectations" bit haha.

            And yeah you're absolutely right. NBN means internet speeds are all over the place, especially with OP's requirements.

            • try2bhelpful on 30/01/2019 - 09:54
              +1

              @HighAndDry: Not just the NBN but also what upstream bandwidth the Internet providers are buying, what throttles they might be applying, consistency of speed access, etc. NBN has not helped the situation but in IMHO the real problem is there is almost no transparency on what is happening and it can vary greatly.

              To paraphrase John Elliot; "World standard Internet system - Pig's Arse". (For all you Rubbery Figures, officionados.)

    • shaybisc on 30/01/2019 - 09:33

      Did

  • shaybisc on 30/01/2019 - 09:18

    Is there a break fee clause in your tenancy agreement?

  • shaybisc on 30/01/2019 - 09:25

    I don't know why people ask a lot of potential ignoramuses about stuff like this. Google breaking a lease + whatever state you live in and get the advice of the experts. This is for NSW

    https://www.fairtrading.nsw.gov.au/housing-and-property/rent…

    • tranter on 30/01/2019 - 09:54

      Yep, so many 'experts' on here.

  • HighAndDry on 30/01/2019 - 09:28
    +1

    Be prepared to pay rent until a new tenant is found, the landlord's letting fees with his agent, and probably an additional amount on top too.

  • shaybisc on 30/01/2019 - 09:39
    +3

    You must travel light if you are ready to leave one week after moving in. I find moving house such a huge hassle that I could not imagine doing it again one week later.

    • [Deactivated] on 30/01/2019 - 09:57

      You must travel light if you are ready to leave one week after moving in.

      Or just really frustrated that couldn't connect to games server to play his favourite game, and might have issues with streaming to his friends while gaming.

      Not to judge, everyone likes different things. There certainly are a group of people (growing these days) that are really really seriously into their games.
      I guess for OP, it's a bit like moving into new home, then discovering you cannot do your favourite thing in new house.
      Hopefully connection will improve, or work around it, by getting 4g plan and using 1 connection solely for gaming, and kids and wife use other connection while he is streaming games and needs the sole use of upload bandwidth.

      • JustASmoothSkin on 30/01/2019 - 12:51

        Your pretty much on point, I don’t play competitively or anything but after working for 3 weeks (doing fifo) I like to be able to come home and play games with the friends I don’t get a chance to catch up with in person.

    • JustASmoothSkin on 30/01/2019 - 12:54

      Dunno, never found it to hard to move. Mind you the vacate clean and repairs to the previous property is the annoying part but that can be alleviated by calling up cleaners and stuff.

  • brokenglish on 30/01/2019 - 09:57
    +1

    Where did you see that your premise has FTTP? This is the f up.

  • [Deactivated] on 30/01/2019 - 12:16
    +1

    I don't think you will have any luck getting out of your lease and why would you want to move house all over again just because you don't want to use telstra. I know their customer service is shit but once you get it up and running you probably wont have any problems.

    I have had similar issues with HFC it took 3 attempts to get it up and running. Why dont you use the modem you bought from
    telstra? In my experience when you try and shortcut the telstra processes you will run into trouble. Try working with telstra and doing it there way rather than trying to carve your own path.

    • JustASmoothSkin on 30/01/2019 - 12:49

      I am using their modem, in fact now I have 2 which I have had to pay almost $500 to have.

  • preferredusername on 30/01/2019 - 20:32

    I don’t know if the problem is where you live necessarily, or if it’s just Telstra? We moved in to our new rental over a month ago and we’re still waiting for internet… it’s never taken less than at least a few weeks at any of the places I’ve lived at, although this instance has been the most drawn out. Maybe take your beef to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman?

  • Hardlyworkin on 31/01/2019 - 06:48
    +1

    It will clearly state ihe costs in your lease. Breaking mine is 2 week's rent plus advertising costs and paying rent until they find a new tenant.

    Sounds like a great opportunity to get the family outside and off their devices ;)

Login or Join to leave a comment
Login Join