Telecom watchdog fails to revoke TPSA fine

The Telecommunications and Postal Regulation (URTiP) office has not yet sent a proposal to Telekomunikacja Polska (TPSA) to reverse zł. 350 million ($87.5 million) in fines against the dominant telecom operator if TPSA drops all court cases contesting the regulator's previous rulings, a URTiP press office employee said last week. Witold Graboś, the URTiP's president, told the WBJ last month that he would consider reversing the fines if TPSA canceled its legal petitions against his office. The fines were levied by Graboś's predecessor, Kazimierz Ferenc, just before he left office at the end of March, to punish TPSA for monopolistic practices. The first fine was for TPSA's refusal to fulfill an agreement with an alternative domestic long-distance (DLD) provider (zł. 300 million) and the second was for the firm's publication of inaccurate information about its revenue from rental lines (zł. 50 million). TPSA filed appeals against the fines. Graboś was not available for comment last week and did not return a phone message. No one else in the URTiP's press office could provide more information.

Last Monday, TPSA issued a statement saying it had withdrawn all complaints and appeals about the range of its activities regulated by the URTiP since the regulatory office declared it the dominant operator on the Polish telecom market. In a statement issued by the URTiP last Tuesday, Graboś said that he would enforce TPSA's market obligations as the dominant operator to ensure fair competition by clarifying the conditions for interconnection agreements between other operators and TPSA as well as conducting an audit of TPSA by July.