UPDATE
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Concerned business owners and resident contacted their federal MP Dan Tehan on Friday evening, after his involvement in helping to rectify a similar issue in the Halls Gap area at Easter.
"I had some concerned small business owners contact me about an internet outage in Ararat on Friday," Mr Tehan said.
"I contacted Telstra that night, and they were able to respond overnight, which is a good outcome for business owners and residents."
Telstra's regional general manager Steve Tinker acknowledged an equipment fault had disrupted fixed line phone and internet services for some customers in Ararat.
"Our technicians identified the issue quickly and replaced the faulty equipment and services were restored in the very early hours of Saturday morning," he said.
"We thank our customers for their patience as we know how much they rely on our service.
"For any Telstra customers still experiencing issues in the area, please contact 13 22 00 to report a fault."
EARLIER
Communications service Telstra has confirmed properties on Grano Street, Blake Street and Girdlestone Street (including Ararat Hospital) have their ADSL and home phone services disrupted.
Telstra states "cable damage caused by independent construction in the area" as the cause of the outage. Customers can still use mobile data.
There is no specific time for restoration at this stage other than Monday, May 13. The Ararat Advertiser has contacted Telstra for more information.
Foster's Mensland owner Graeme Foster said his business along with many others in the town were impacted by the outage.
"I made contact with my internet provider this morning and the best they could do was tell me after 24 hours might contact you," he said.
"They did a lot of testing today - but we haven't had any luck.
"It has impacted our trading today (Friday) particularly with the change of weather."
Mr Foster said at the start of trade on Friday he had to "goodwill" some items of school clothing to his customers.
"It was a bit of trust on both ends but school children needed jumpers to go to school with," he said.
"They didn't have any other way to pay besides on eftpos so we took some details with the expectations they return to pay.
"I also had a travelling woman come in and wanted to make a significant purchase but was unable to."
Mr Foster said limiting the use of eftpos was the biggest impact on his business.
"We could live without our computer systems and emails for the day. To be honest, we have missed sales because of it," he said.
"The hardest part is we have had no communication about this and we don't know when it will be back on and will be coming into work tomorrow (Saturday) not sure if we have internet or not."