VK Logger Ham Radio Forum Archive

VK2AAH wrote:First, are you a WIA member?

Yes.

Second, would you pay the cost of full time admin staff to sit in the office at Melbourne to process applications as they appear?

I'm not sledging WIA; I have no qualms with the WIA at all, and I wouldn't a paid member if that were the case. Considering it's an almost 100% volunteer organisation they do pretty damned well. Every time I've been in touch with them about something I've gotten a quick and helpful response.

What I do have an issue with is how ACMA have somehow decided they needed to outsource what should be a fairly basic core business function to the WIA.

It's not like dozens of other administrations around the world have had to do the same, so what makes ACMA so special?

but this is the problems with hams- they so often complain about the level of services while either not wanting to pay what that costs, or want it for free

No, the problem I have is with watching public agencies needlessly wasting taxpayers' funds on inefficient business processes.

That last point Mat is where we have to agree to disagree... if every government agency was staffed to have someone just waiting for the next piece of paper to come in we would be paying alot more than we already do for our services. ACMA have to recover their costs & having surplus staff, which is really what you are suggesting because workload is not constant, is not sustainable... I would prefer to see them employ more technically trained field staff not to work for the hams but to do more for those license holders who pay more for a single channel than a nest of hams do...

Cheers


Richard

I'm not sure we're both on the same page here.

I'm not advocating having every agency staffed to the hilt just to have someone just waiting for the next piece of paper to come in; I'm advocating having agencies like ACMA remove as much tedious, repetitive grunt work, that can be automated, from humans as possible (such as data entry or in this case in particular, callsign assignment), and only involving humans in those parts of the process where human decision making is genuinely required.

The banking industry, for example has spent billions of dollars in recent years doing just that to reduce their administrative overheads, with the end result being record profits for shareholders and the highest customer satisfaction ratings they've seen in a decade.

The outcome of this type of administrative process improvement is a better of service for all of that's organisation's customers, and huge cost savings that can be reinvested in other parts of the business... such as technically trained field staff

Received my advanced reciprocal licence today. Pretty satisfied.

I applied for a new licence recently and had it done in around 6-7 business days. My initial fcall took a little longer

VK3FPAZ wrote:I applied for a new licence recently and had it done in around 6-7 business days. My initial fcall took a little longer

I paid a renewal end of June , paperwork arrived in the mail yesterday

To update expectations those that have applied for repeater licenses in recent times, here's my experience...

Submitted application to WIA in August 2014.

Received advice from ACMA today that whilst they have now received my application from the WIA, my repeater license probably won't progress for 4-5 months due to workload and available resources.

Good thing my KL450 project is still a work in progress. I'm in no rush and this is not a whinge. Just putting this up for the information of future applicants so that they can re-adjust their expectations.

Cheers,

Surely the licencing/issue process can be further automated....

My pilot's licence medical took a total of 2 hrs to be turned around by CASA today...all done by email.

Nik,

The issue is that amateur repeater applications go through an ACMA assigner- that is where the delay is because ACMA don't want to fund this service. The poor engineers in Canberra doing this deserve a medal... There is nothing stopping you or anyone else from using an ACMA "accredited person" to do the assignment work. Then it progresses directly to licensing. However you need to be prepared to pay for it, and it isn't cheap.

Cheers

Richard
VK2AAH

VK7YXX wrote: I'm a returning amateur and last went thought the licencing process back in '89. To be honest I'm a bit concerned about the process currently required to obtain a licence.


- I downloaded and filled out the operator's licence application - OK, what? No credit cards? I could email or fax it, but that's useless without payment (cheque or money order only).
- I waited until Monday and went to the post office, got a money order ($6 charge!) and sent it off at the same time with the callsign recommendation.
- I waited another week - nothing.
- The following Thursday I appeared as a client in the database (no licence though).
- Looked again on the Monday - nothing.
- Rang up the ACMA and was told that they process applications in bulk and I "should" have a licence this week or early next week - seriously?
- Still waiting.

Now, in this day and age, and given that this is the ACMA (who is responsible for COMMUNICATIONS and the INTERNET), surely there's a better way. There's not many things that take a month to do these days.

Hello Don

Is the ACMA that doesn't take Credit Cards?

73
Glenn

Of course they take credit cards!

VK2AAH wrote:Of course they take credit cards!

That's why I thought it strange.....I have used CC with them quite a few times.....

From what I can tell, the licence issue timescale (for normal operator licences, not repeaters) is effected by:

1. the requirement to post hard copy docs back and forward instead of using email; and
2. the limited staffing at the WIA and (to a lesser extent) the ACMA.

As I understand it, hard copy is a requirement of the agreement between ACMA/WIA.

There must be a way to automate the process and thereby reduce processing times (and workload for WIA office staff...) - automatic callsign issue, electronic transmission of docs, etc..

73
Glenn

But the whole complaint looks a bit dodgy based on:

- I waited until Monday and went to the post office, got a money order ($6 charge!) and sent it off at the same time with the callsign recommendation.
- I waited another week - nothing.
- The following Thursday I appeared as a client in the database (no licence though).
- Looked again on the Monday - nothing.

So if it was sent on the Monday at best they got it on the Wednesday (they call it snail mail for a reason) so he rang them 8 days after it would have got there. He then waited another week (day 15), and then looked on the database the following Monday (day 19).

Then:

- Rang up the ACMA and was told that they process applications in bulk and I "should" have a licence this week or early next week - seriously?

So that would take it through to about day 26-30. Sounds pretty normal to me.

If Amateurs want a better service then they better get ready to pay, and pay a lot more than $80 a year. And if it is deregulated and charged based on the value of the spectrum we have use of then hang on to your wallets because the moths are going to be released like never before.

Cheers


Richard
VK2AAH

Agreed, but surely they could automate it to a certain extent, if only at the WIA end.....

Simple solution... deregulate licensing all together and give the WIA a link into the ACMA database. There shouldn't be two steps in the process. WIA manages the callsign database and collects the license fee on ACMA's behalf... one step. In return the WIA receives an admin fee (out of the $80) for providing the service. And I think the $20 callsign fee could be merged into that final cost to make it cheaper and quicker.

Before anyone says "it will never happen" I'd suggest that it is highly likely. Look at car rego renewals in NSW- few of us go near a motor registry. You can do it on-line, you can even pay at the mechanics when you get the inspection done. Things none of us thought possible a decade ago are now reality. ACMA is a spectrum bank or agent, it doesn't want to be an administrator any more because that costs money to do... let someone else do it and if they can do it more cheaply or make a $ or two out of it then good luck to them. The WIA is the logical body to do it.

Cheers

Richard
VK2AAH

Great idea.

Given the current review, it may well get up, hopefully.

It appears that credit cards an be used to renew an account. But not pay a NEW account. This may have recently changed. But I've always found I had to use a cheque/money order for something new (and not related to an existing user ID)

VK2AAH wrote:Nik,

The issue is that amateur repeater applications go through an ACMA assigner- that is where the delay is because ACMA don't want to fund this service. The poor engineers in Canberra doing this deserve a medal... There is nothing stopping you or anyone else from using an ACMA "accredited person" to do the assignment work. Then it progresses directly to licensing. However you need to be prepared to pay for it, and it isn't cheap.

Cheers

Richard
VK2AAH

Richard, yes, I understand the situation and whilst I could go through an "accredited organisation", I'm in no rush with this one and hence I'm happy to wait. I'm acutely aware of the third-party commercial cost of "frequency assignments", particularly for new carrier-grade uWave links.

Not sure about the rest of the chatter about payment arrangements, credit cards, etc. I've never had any dramas with the ACMA, credit card & online payments - in fact I've found them to be quite instantaneous with the online payment system - like a matter of seconds whilst speaking with them over the phone.

Everyone, enjoy your Christmas!!

Cheers,

So it still takes less time to build a repeater than approve the licence for it ?