The station lost approximately $5000.
UPDATE
After publication of this report, National Australia Bank has this evening reached out to PBS for further information.
We will keep you updated on developments.
ORIGINAL REPORT BELOW
On Saturday May 26th, the second last day of Melbourne community station PBS 106.7’s major member fundraiser, staff and volunteers found they couldn’t process any credit cards.
‘Our most important fundraiser for the year, and we were dead in the water’, said station GM Adrian Basso.
The PBS online banking portal through National Australia Bank had gone down, along with dozens of NAB services.
The seven-hour nationwide NAB outage took down ATMs, EFTPOS, internet banking, mobile banking services and call centre operations, affecting thousands of individuals and businesses.
With fundraising volunteers and staff on board for the PBS fundraiser from 6am, Basso was about to head off for a restorative spot of tai chi on his rostered day off, before receiving a phone call from the station.
‘I didn’t get to do the meditation that morning,’ said Basso.
NAB released a statement assuring those affected ‘We’re committed to making this right for customers, and will work with any customer who has experienced financial loss to ensure they’re not unfairly impacted.’
PBS estimates that over three and a half hours, the station lost approximately $5000 in wasted resources and lost money, and until this morning, the compensation claim seemed to be on track.
“We got in contact with NAB today and after providing details on the extent of the outage, the money lost, the wasted resources, the stress and more, the customer service rep said they would talk to their supervisor and come back with a reference number.
“When they came back they said that compensation claims finished 1 July. I explained that our campaign finished 30 June – and their information page [see below], had no such advice.
“You would think if you had an info page, you would include that critical piece of information.”
While Basso and PBS have kept their cool while reaching out to NAB to ‘make it right’, other supporters have taken to social media to criticise NAB’s rejection of the comp claim, and the bank’s slogan, #morethanmoney.
‘Hey @NAB, your slogan is #morethanmoney. Community radio encapsulates this in so many ways. Shame on you for rejecting @pbsfm compensation claim for the outage during #RadioFestival2018’.
