Cara Denman, proprietor of the Priceline Pharmacy in the Orange City Centre, said they were left without phone or internet connection at the end of last week.

Mrs Denman said the dramas began after technicians installed the modem for the national broadband last Monday.

“We’ve been cut off four times,” she said.

“The first time it took five hours to get the number directed to a mobile phone.”

On Friday she said the drama had hit a peak.

“We’ve had no phone line for 48 hours.

“Yesterday our internet went down as well.

“We can’t contact Medicare.

“Yesterday I had to get my girls to go to every GP and every nursing home we service to let them know we were still operating.

“Sometimes it’s the phone that is down, sometimes it is the internet and sometimes it’s the phone and the internet.”

Mrs Denman she had been running the pharmacy for 12 years without telecommunications problems.

But that changed when technicians tried to install the NBN.

“They installed the modem successfully on Monday.”

However, the situation soon got worse.

“They have made multiple visits over it.

“I have spent hours on the phone trying to sort this out.”

Mrs Denman said initially Telstra was able to divert the calls to a mobile phone so that customers could get through.

However by the end of the week that diversion was not working.

She said customers had told her when they rang the pharmacy they received a message saying it had been disconnected.

Mrs Denman said she feared customers would think they had closed down and that’s why she had to resort to sending staff out to knock on doors and let people know they were still open.

A Telstra spokesperson apologised for the dramas.

“We are working to have the issue resolved as quickly as possible,” she said.

“This is not the experience we want for our customers and we have contacted the customer to apologise.”