Top Gear presenter Richard Hammond was the face of the XT advertisements, which were filmed while he was in New Zealand for the programme's live show last year.
Hammond is not here for the live Top Gear show this weekend in Auckland, but that did not stop fellow hosts, Jeremy Clarkson and James May, having a laugh at his - and Telecom's - expense.
During Thursday's opening night, the pair said Hammond was missing from the show because he was too embarrassed to return to New Zealand.
Then a supposed live link back to Hammond in Britain went blank because, the pair joked, the XT network had crashed.
Hammond could have been paid around $200,000 for promoting XT, according to one report.
The mocking came shortly before Telecom suspended four Philippines-based staff for sending abusive messages to customers.
The inquiry was launched after a Wanganui woman received an abusive message seemingly from a customer service representative saying "f . . . you".
The messages, sent to five Telecom customers, were tracked back to Manila where Telecom outsources call centre duties to a company called Sitel.
Four Sitel employees have been suspended and will be investigated.
"We have over 1500 team members in New Zealand and 800 in Manila," general manager of customer services Trish Keith said.
"They will all be massively disappointed by this event."
The company says it has apologised to the customers who received the text messages.
The scandal came soon after the XT network broke down last month leaving thousands of customers without coverage for days.
