About 1400 customers lost their broadband service connection in the South Island after a fibre-optic cable was accidentally cut by a contractor in Rakaia.
Spark spokeswoman Lucy Fullarton said customers using ultrafast broadband in Dunedin, Oamaru, Queenstown, Invercargill and Timaru lost their internet service about 10.25am.
More than 150 customers who receive broadband over copper wires were affected in Willowby and Hinds.
Technicians restored the services just before 8pm yesterday, she said.
Palms Motel Dunedin owner Alex Greenan said the outage caused a ''huge'' disruption to his business in High St.
''It is dramatic for the business because we can't see what has been booked online. We are like a one-armed paperhanger. It is tough going.''
Sims Brake Services parts salesman Brendon Perry said the broadband outage resulted in the online catalogue being unavailable, so orders for automotive parts could not be made in the South Dunedin shop.
Manager Neil Perry said the shop's average daily revenue was $6000 and sales were down yesterday because of the outage.
He would not try to recoup lost earnings from Spark.
''It's just bad bloody luck but what do you do? It costs you more in lawyers fees to try and get $3000 or $4000. It's just a fact of life.''
Mitre 10 Mega Dunedin group chief executive officer Neil Finn-House said the shop had a contingency plan and the business was running as usual when the shop lost its broadband service yesterday.
The eftpos terminals had memory to store transactions for processing when the service was restored.
''It's a challenge for management but it doesn't affect our customers,'' Mr Finn-House said.
