Telstra had previously said the move's impact on financial year 2016 earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) would be $90 million for the nine months ending June 30, 2016. Telstra had argued that it would have to keep maintaining its copper network even as millions of customers were shifted onto the national broadband network. It believed the one-off increase in charges would help pay for the discrepancy. But the ACCC ultimately decided that the shrinking base of copper customers should not be punished for staying put and ruled it was against the long term interest of end users. The final decision is 0.2 per cent less of a cut compared to its draft decision issued in late June. "Users of Telstra's network should not pay the higher costs that result from fewer customers as NBN migration occurs," ACCC chair Rod Sims said in a statement. "If there is no adjustment for these higher costs then customers who have not yet been migrated to the NBN will ultimately pay significantly higher prices for copper based services." Strong allies overruled

Telstra had a strong ally in then-communications minister Malcolm Turnbull and Finance Minister Mathias Cormann, who both wrote to the ACCC calling for it to support the telco giant's proposal because doing otherwise could destabilise the NBN's rollout and the $11 billion deal both parties had struck to lease the copper network. "It will undermine the integrity of [the $11 billion deal with NBN] if Telstra shareholders are deprived of the benefit of arrangements they did not initiate but negotiated in good faith [and] this may weaken Telstra commitment to current reforms," the ministers said at the time. "[Optus, iiNet and TPG] clearly understood the commercial value of the commitments ... and the centrality of those commitments to the reform process. "The is disappointing to see them pursuing short term financial advantage." The Department of Communications secretary Drew Clarke, who is now Mr Turnbull's acting chief of staff, later backed this up with an official letter to the regulator reiterating its support for Telstra's position. But all of this ultimately came to naught. The ACCC's Mr Sims told Fairfax Media he welcomed Mr Turnbull and Senator Cormann's intervention because it made their personal views public.

"I think it's a great sign when government ministers or departmental secretaries have views they make public so all can see them," he said. "We took all views into account including theirs and they understand we are independent and we accord all views equal respect. "But in the end we make what we believe is the right decision and that's what we've done here." The decision could also be problematic for NBN, which needs as many customers as possible to switch onto its services to avoid a shortfall in revenue. This will make it more profitable for telcos to keep their customers on copper-based services until they are forced to move onto the NBN - a shift that takes place 18 months after an area is hooked up and declared "ready for service". A spokesman for Telstra said the company was strongly disappointed and considering its various options for appeal. "The decision does not follow the ACCC's own fixed pricing principles that require Telstra to be given the opportunity to recover from wholesale customers the costs of providing services to them," he said in a statement. "Any regulated entity should be concerned by this decision, especially in circumstances where merits review has been removed.

"We are particularly disappointed to see the ACCC depart from its draft decision in March which recognised the importance of providing price stability to the industry at this time of transition to the NBN." But Mr Sims said it was "literally impossible" for the regulator to have a verdict that pleased all parties and that the ACCC was ready for the chance of legal action. "I don't know of any other regulated asset where you're actually replacing the current asset with a brand-new asset and where the one who owns the asset [Telstra] has reached an agreement with the new company NBN to transfer its services while being rewarded for that," he said. "Whatever view one has of this decision it just does not translate more broadly. "[Legal action from Telstra] is always a possibility [but] we have put a lot of work into our decision and it's taken a lot of time to put together but we're confident that the decision we've made is well-within the rules."