Optus outage robs dying mum of final goodbye with daughter

Optus’s hours-long outage cost a Sydney woman the final precious moments with her dying mum, robbing the pair of their chance to say goodbye.

An Optus store. Picture: Linda Higginson

When Sydney woman Rachel left her mum, Joy, at a local northern beaches hospital, she didn’t imagine it was the final time she would see her alive.

Rachel lived just 10 minutes from the hospital in Mona Vale and was told by hospital staff, if there were any issues, they would call.

But Optus’s disastrous communications outage this week meant Rachel didn’t receive that vital message.

In fact, she didn’t even learn there was an outage until her daughter FaceTimed to let her know.

The Optus store on Elizabeth Street in Hobart. Picture: Linda Higginson

Fearing the worst, Rachel rushed to hospital. By the time she arrived, it was too late.

“Mum had passed away,” she told 2GB.

“You can’t get those final moments back. We thought everything was fine (then) to come back and find her passed away.”

Rachel said it was “disgraceful” that her family couldn’t be contacted in an emergency.

“When your mum is on her last legs, your mum needs you, I need to be able to have faith that I can get a phone call about something this precious to me,” she said.

Many businesses experienced frustrating network outages during the Optus system crash.

“You put so much faith in your phone these days. I had it next to me just in case something happened, so I could get that call and have those last moments with her.”

Rachel said, after learning her mum had died, the outage prevented her from calling her children and extended family to break the news.

Though Optus is considering compensation for its affected customers, Rachel said no amount of money that could make up for her loss.

“You can’t get those final moments back,” she said.

“We trusted (Optus) as our contact to our mum before she passed away… We can never, ever get that time back.”

Rachel wasn’t the only Optus customer who expressed a loss of faith in the telco.

Dozens of photos taken in the wake of the outage showed queues forming at the doorways of Optus’s main competitors, Vodafone and Telstra, suggesting many Aussies were ready rid themselves of their troubled provider.

“Walked past a long line of people at Telstra at Fountain Gate just now. The Optus store next door was empty,” one person wrote on X.

“Ask the people who switched to Telstra today. The lines were HUGE at Highpoint Telstra,” added another.

Another separate set of images, taken at a Melbourne shopping centre, showed an “increasingly agitated” crowd gathered outside an Optus store while, across the way, a Vodafone shop was inundated with new sign-ups.

Angus Kidman, of comparison website Finder, said the outage was likely a case of “two strikes and you’re out” for Optus.

“Customer loyalty is already on shaky ground following the data breach in 2022,” he said.

“Optus could be facing a customer exodus as the outage may be the final straw for some who have only just finished dealing with the leak. The fear of being stuck without mobile phone connectivity is very real, especially for those who rely on their phone for directions and work.”