Around 2,500 Telecom broadband customers are struggling to connect online, with the problem spanning across Auckland, Tauranga and Napier.

According to the telco giant, the outage began at 8pm last night, with a spokeswoman for company confirming: “Our technicians are investigating the root cause and are working on a fix as a matter of urgency.

"We're still investigating the cause and we've got technicians working on it as we speak.

"Although it's a small number of customers, they are spread over Auckland, Napier and Tauranga, and we've also had some reports from Northland.''

Following the news, one cheeky Telecom customer urged the company to "spark" his broadband connection back to life, a timely play on the telco's imminent name change.

Hi @telecomnz can you 'spark' my broadband connection back to life now please?

— Hayden Shaw (@haydenshaw) March 3, 2014