29.01.2024

Following the national public consultation process, ANCOM together with the industry has agreed the draft decision on withdrawing the individual obligations incumbent on the providers of voice call termination at fixed and - respectively - mobile locations, that had been designated as having significant market power in the previous round of market analyses.

The Authority regularly carries out reviews of the relevant wholesale markets, in accordance with the national and European legislation in force, in order to ensure that retail telephone markets function under competitive conditions, thus protecting the interests of end-users.

Through the draft decision debated and agreed with the industry, ANCOM withdraws all the obligations imposed at national level on the operators identified with significant power on the relevant markets corresponding to voice call termination services provided at fixed locations, respectively at mobile locations in public telephone networks.

The decision is based on the analyses carried out by ANCOM on the two call termination markets in order to assess the opportunity to maintain, modify or withdraw previously imposed obligations, which showed that - despite the existence of barriers to market entry - the competitive circumstances have changed since the previous round of market analyses. The conclusions of the latest market analyses were mainly determined by the entry into force, on 1 July 2021, of Commission Regulation (EU) 2021/654, which sets maximum termination rates applicable at European level. Thus - having eliminated the most important competitive problem that could arise in the identified markets i.e., the service providers’ possibility to manifest their market power by charging excessive rates for terminating calls from other networks in their individual public telephony networks - the Authority deemed that the risk of other competitive problems occurring at national level is strongly diminished.

Whenever certain obligations imposed on providers with significant market power are withdrawn, the operators who are buyers and are affected by these measures must become aware in advance of the changes occurred on the market. Therefore, ANCOM established a transitional period of one year. During this period, the specific obligations previously imposed will be maintained under the same conditions.

European consultation

According to the European regulatory framework in the field, ANCOM is to notify the proposed measures to the European Commission, the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications (BEREC) and the national regulatory authorities of the other Member States of the European Union. The European Commission, BEREC and the other regulatory authorities will be able to submit comments and suggestions to ANCOM within one month from the notification date.