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Speaker 1: Now to another subject.

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Speaker 2: Altogether, it is only three days until Spark turns off

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Speaker 2: its three G. If you have a three G phone,

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Speaker 2: you are not going to be able to make any

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Speaker 2: calls anymore, and that includes one one one calls. This

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Speaker 2: is Tuesday next week. Spark is urging anyone with the

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Speaker 2: three G phone to take action before the network is

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Speaker 2: shut down. Leila Ashford is Spark's chief Brand and Corporate

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Speaker 2: Affairs officer and with us now, Hi Lela.

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Speaker 1: Hey, hey, going very well, thank you. How many people

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Speaker 1: have you still got a running on the old three G?

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Speaker 3: So looking at it yesterday, we've got about zero point

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Speaker 3: two percent of our total data traffic, which is about

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Speaker 3: one point six percent of our devices. Now, that's made

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Speaker 3: up of lots of different things. It's not all individuals

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Speaker 3: with a phone. It's also things like IoT equipment for example,

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Speaker 3: or business data connections. So there's still people on there

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Speaker 3: and that's why we are encouraging them to move off

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Speaker 3: to use this weekend, get into a store and get

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Speaker 3: onto a four G capable device.

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Speaker 2: What does that translate into actual numbers the percentage, Well.

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Speaker 3: It differs because there's lots of different connections on there,

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Speaker 3: so I don't have the specific number to hand, but

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Speaker 3: there'll be some of that will be people with phones.

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Speaker 3: Some of it will be things like it could be

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Speaker 3: a security gate or a medical alarm, or it might

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Speaker 3: be something like a iPad that just has a data

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Speaker 3: connection for example. So lots of different types of things

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Speaker 3: in there.

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Speaker 2: But we do know thousands though, wouldn't it It would

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Speaker 2: be in the thousands absolutely, Wow, are.

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Speaker 1: You reckons going in here? Leela? Have people just not

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Speaker 1: realized or do they just not care? Do you think?

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Speaker 3: So? We've done a lot of research into it. We've

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Speaker 3: been planning this shutdown for well over a year now

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Speaker 3: and so we've been testing awareness. Awareness is really really high.

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Speaker 3: But what customers tell us is there's a large proportion

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Speaker 3: who will just leave it to the last minute or

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Speaker 3: maybe have this as another phone and they're not so

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Speaker 3: worried about it not working, or it could something that

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Speaker 3: someone's not even aware they still have. Like there's lots

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Speaker 3: of different reasons for it.

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Speaker 1: If I kindle expect.

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Speaker 2: If my Kendleleela has run out of battery like it

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Speaker 2: has for I reckon the last year, are you still

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Speaker 2: registering it or has it gone dead for you?

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Speaker 3: So it will be I'm not sure. I'm not exactly

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Speaker 3: sure with the Kindle, but we do have devices like

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Speaker 3: that that are not necessarily ours to sell. We've been

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Speaker 3: communicating with the people who make those products sell those

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Speaker 3: products to make sure that their customers are aware as well.

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Speaker 3: We've also been doing that for well over a year now,

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Speaker 3: So anyone with a device impacted like that should already

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Speaker 3: be aware of that.

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Speaker 2: So the if the knowledge out there, like the awareness

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Speaker 2: is as high as you say it is, does this

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Speaker 2: mean we're not going to have the same problem as

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Speaker 2: in Australia. Because in Australia, as you well know, when

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Speaker 2: the three G networks were shut down, even though they

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Speaker 2: had all the warning, boy did the winging startup.

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Speaker 3: Look, we know technology change isn't fun for anyone, and

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Speaker 3: we suspect despite every best intention. I mean, we've sent

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Speaker 3: over four million notifications on three G shutdown everything from

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Speaker 3: emails social texting. Every time someone with a non three

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Speaker 3: G compliant device picks up their phone to make a call,

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Speaker 3: someone tells them it's not compliant. I mean, we've seen

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Speaker 3: on forums people complaining about how much we're communicating to them.

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Speaker 3: So we're doing everything we can there's always someone who'll

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Speaker 3: fall through the cracks and not be aware, and our

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Speaker 3: team will be there and ready to kind of get

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Speaker 3: them sorted.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, now what is this business with you turning

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Speaker 2: off three hundred four G phones Because four G is

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Speaker 2: not the network you're shutting down, So why are you

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Speaker 2: shutting them down?

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Speaker 3: So this is a really unique situation where there's this

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Speaker 3: tiny subgroup of phones. As you say, it's three hundred,

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Speaker 3: they're not phones we have sold through Spark stores. They've

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Speaker 3: been sold through other distributors, and they act a bit strangely.

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Speaker 3: So basically, once three G shuts down, they'll be able

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Speaker 3: to make normal calls, they'll be able to make texts,

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Speaker 3: they'll be using the four G network as normal. But

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Speaker 3: then if they go to call Triple one, their device

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Speaker 3: has been configured in a way where it only calls

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Speaker 3: Triple one with the three G network. So what we're

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Speaker 3: really worried about is that someone could be going on

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Speaker 3: with their life and thinking their phone is completely fine

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Speaker 3: because it's operating as normal, But then God forbid, they

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Speaker 3: need to call Triple one, they're not going to be

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Speaker 3: able to. And so it's just with this very very

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Speaker 3: small subset of phones that we think the safest thing

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Speaker 3: to do is block it because that will obviously cause

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Speaker 3: that person to be like, there's something wrong with my phone.

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Speaker 3: I need to go and figure out what's going on,

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Speaker 3: and then we will get them onto the right phone.

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Speaker 1: Okay, Leela listen, thanks very much for talking us through it, and.

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Speaker 2: Good luck for next Tuesday, and they look forward to

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Speaker 2: all the winges who come out and definitely talk to

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Speaker 2: stuff in the Herald about it. Leelah Ashford, Spark Chief

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Speaker 2: Brand and Corporate Affairs Officer.

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Speaker 1: For more from Heather Duplessy and Drive, listen live to

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