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Telecom
May 2019 www.intellinews.com I Page 21
Romania’s consumer protection body tells Vodafone to cancel price hikes
Romania’s consumer protection authority (ANPC) has ordered Vodafone Romania to give up recently announced price increases, which it defined as “incorrect commercial behaviour”, according to Adevarul.
The company was the first local telecom operator to pass the newly introduced 2% turnover tax to end-user prices, a move followed by some of its peers already.
It notified its clients that the price of services provided to them would increase starting May due to the new taxes levied on telecom companies (2% of their turnover) through the government’s emer- gency decree 114/2018, also known as the “greed tax” decree.
ANPC president Marius Pirvu issued the order on Friday, May 3. The other big telecom opera- tors (Orange, Telekom, RCS&RDS and UPC) may also be targeted by similar controls and sanc-
tions in the following period as all of them have announced price increases due to the new taxes, according to Adevarul.
ANPC announced that it had contacted the respec- tive telecom operator after receiving complaints from its clients related to the price increases.
“Following controls carried out by ANPC, we found that the respective economic operator uses an unfair commercial practice, contrary to professional diligence because it chose
to transfer some costs – incurred following legislation changes, to consumers, using a position of dominant and psychological force,” ANPC explained.
ANPC admitted that clients can choose to end their contracts, but it said that the procedure for closing a subscription and porting the number to another network takes time, which is why most clients would likely accept the price increase.
O2 telecoms operator in Czech Republic records Q1 profit of CZK1.24bn
Telecoms operator O2 Czech Republic has posted a Q1 drop in net profit of 7% y/y to CZK1.24bn (€48.2mn). The company said it was caused by higher investment in pro-growth areas last year, resulting in an increase in depreciation of tangible assets, O2 announced.
Consolidated operating revenue increased by 0.5% to CZK9.25bn (€359.5mn) in 1Q19. Ebitda increased by 10.4% to CZK2.2bn (€85.5mn).
Operating revenue declined slightly by 0.3% to CZK7.5bn (€291.5mn). Mobile data, financial services and O2 TV were the key revenue growth drivers.
“In 1Q19, we continued bringing many innovations to our customers. Since February, we have been offering new FREE tariffs with a larger portion of data without a price increase,” said CEO and board chairman of O2 Czech Republic Jindrich Fremut.