Telecom gives 2degrees SIM cards to hospital staff

Telecom has started moving staff from the Hutt Valley district health board off its XT network to a more reliable system. Photo / Northern Advocate.

Telecom is giving out rival 2degrees' services to key hospital staff on XT as backup in case the network, which has failed four times since December, goes down again.

Canterbury DHB told nzherald.co.nz of the plans this afternoon, following admissions from other DHBs that they were moving staff off Telecom's XT network for fear of breakdowns during emergencies.

Many organisations are negotiating with Telecom after repeated XT failures, which have cost Telecom $15 million in customer compensation.

Canterbury DHB's corporate services general manager, Murray Dickson, said the DHB had a contract with Telecom, and its staff were being moved off XT.

Key clinical staff had been given 2degrees' SIM cards by Telecom, to use with their XT mobile phones when the network failed, or were moved to Telecom's old CDMA network, Mr Dickson said.

The DHB was concerned with XT's reliability and was pressing Telecom to get it fixed, he said.

"In preparation for any possible future outages, key clinical staff have been issued with either CDMA (Telecom's older technology) phones or have, at Telecom's expense, been issued with SIM cards from cellular phone provider 2degrees."

The DHB's primary emergency response was put on a pager system and was unaffected by any of the outages, he said.

2degrees spokeswoman Bryonny Hilless said her company was not aware of the move by Telecom.

"But it's good to see Telecom is providing their customers with a reliable network," Ms Hilless said.

She said Canterbury DHB staff using 2degrees phones in Christchurch would be supported by the 2degrees network but outside of the city they would be roaming on Vodafone's network after an agreement was struck between the companies.

Meanwhile the Otago and Southland DHB is reviewing its contract with Telecom. It has 2000 phone contracts with the telecommunications giant with 400 of them on the XT network.
Chief information officer Gary Taylor said no patients had been compromised by the four outages since Christmas.

In the Hutt Valley, north of Wellington, Telecom began transferring clinical hospital staff to a reliable network after four outages that could have jeopardised emergency responses.

The health board's acting chief executive, Michael Hundleby, said he had not been contacted by Telecom until last Friday.

"We're very disappointed that Telecom didn't contact us until very, very recently about how they could assist us."

The DHB and Telecom were in talks last week, but he could not say exactly when the discussions started, except that it was only after Telecom investigated whether it had missed any clients, Mr Hundleby said.

Critical clinical staff - who wait to be contacted by mobile phone in an emergency - needed a reliable network for patient safety.

They were switched to Telecom's old network during the past week and all other staff would be moved as soon as possible, he said.

At Fonterra, 878 staff are on XT, and 40 have been affected by its outages.

A company spokeswoman said it was investigating whether to stay on the network.

It was holding off switching anyone to a new network until the review was completed, she said.

Fonterra has also postponed 3000 planned moves to XT, including 1500 staff who are with Vodafone.

Meanwhile, Wellington's Capital & Coast DHB says it is in talks with Telecom about the risks of having its staff on XT.

Chief executive Ken Whelan told a board meeting yesterday the DHB was looking at the possibility of switching networks, and he hoped Telecom would not charge them for it.

Telecom Gen-i spokeswoman Karmela Salisbury said the company was working with all clients to find a solution.

Business clients would not pay anything if they wanted to break their contracts, Ms Salisbury said.

"We're working hard to work out if there are interim solutions, but if it did get to that point I'm pretty sure we would not be charging clients."

Police media adviser Grant Ogilvie said some police staff were on XT, but critical communications were done over radio and there was no urgency to switch.

Blenheim's Wairau Hospital staff have moved to pagers, and the Hawke's Bay DHB has moved to Telecom's old network.

Telecom have so far not returned phone calls.