Press Releases

Lower Fixed Telephony Interconnection Rates as of 1 July 2012

29.06.2012
 
As a result of the regulations of the National Authority for Management and Regulation in Communications (ANCOM), the interconnection rates charged by the operators of fixed telephone networks will decrease by 18%, to 0.67 eurocents/minute, as of 1 July 2012. This is the second phase of lowering the maximum interconnection rates in view of call termination on  fixed telephone networks, after the 15.5% cut applied in March 2012.
The termination rate is the cost of a call originated in an operator’s network and terminated in another operator’s network, paid by the operator of the originating network to the operator of the terminating network on the wholesale market. This cost is included in the tariff paid by the originating end-user. Charging excessive termination rates as compared to the costs may affect competition in the entire telephony market and may distort the users’ consumption behaviour.
The rates have been regulated following a market study conducted by ANCOM in 2011 which showed that all the 51 providers of services of access to a public fixed telephone network active on the Romanian market at that time were holding significant power on the wholesale market of call termination on their individual networks. ANCOM imposed on all these providers the obligation to observe certain maximum interconnection rates, in view of terminating the calls originated in other operators’ networks.
Alongside the obligation to decrease the interconnection rates, ANCOM also imposed on the 51 providers the obligation of transparency, the obligation of allowing access to, and use of, certain specific network elements and of the associated infrastructure, the obligation of non-discrimination and the obligation of price control (including the obligation to maintain the symmetry of the termination rates).
The number of access lines (fixed telephone posts) in Romania amounted to 4.69 million at end-2011, up by 4% as compared to 2010, while the same percentage growth was registered by the number of subscribers, who reached 4.04 million.The fixed telephony penetration rate per 100 households was 54%, whereas the traffic volume achieved by the end-users on the fixed public telephone networks amounted to 6 billion minutes in 2011.
According to the statistical data reported by the providers, the electronic communications market was worth EUR 3.5 billion (RON 14.8 billion) in 2011. The revenues obtained by the mobile telephony operators from Romania from the services of voice call termination amounted to EUR 0.47 billion (RON 1.97 billion), accounting for 13.3% of the electronic communications market total value, whereas the fixed telephony operators obtained EUR 0.05 billion (RON 0.23 billion) from the services of voice call termination, which means 1.5% of the electronic communications market total value.
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