Bruce Billson 

Published in The Daily Telegraph and the Courier-Mail

15 October 2024

When a small business has a problem with a Big Tech digital platform - such as having your account shut down after being hacked - solving it can be a nightmare.

These platforms require a time and resource-poor small business to navigate the most elaborate maze of dead-ends.

Locked out of your account? The advice from the big tech firms is, please log into your account to tell us you can't log into your account. To quote John McEnroe, you can't be serious!

This run-around means it can take months to resolve problems and get back to business. In the past three months, the number of complaints about digital platforms to my agency has soared by 86 per cent compared with the same time last year.

Over the past two years, the number of small and family businesses who have suffered some sort of disruption to their business at the hands of a digital platform has more than doubled.

Whether it is Facebook, Instagram, Uber, Amazon, eBay, Shopify or other providers, small and family businesses are getting a raw deal when they need help.

Digital platforms need to urgently lift their game and provide clear, appropriate and easily accessible help for small business - with a real person they can talk to.

Small business owners watch helplessly as the financial and emotional damage occurs in real time with no ability to stop it. Credit cards linked to accounts are often used by the hacker.

Over the past three months, 73 per cent of the disputes that have come to us involve Meta's platforms Facebook and Instagram. Nearly two-thirds of those relate to accounts being hacked.

Uber is 17 per cent of our caseload, and one in four of those cases are about not being paid.

The common thread is small business owners and those who are self-employed are devastated by sudden, unexpected account suspensions, and then having no clear avenue to resolve it.

These platforms need to implement clear, appropriate and standardised procedures to enable a timely resolution for disputes, so small businesses can have their dispute handled efficiently, hopefully resolved, and resume operating their businesses as quickly as possible.

Bruce Billson is the Australian Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman