OREANDA-NEWS. April 28, 2009. The Commission of the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS Russia) found that "Severo-Zapadny Telecom" OJSC violated Part 1 Article 10 of the Federal Law "On Protection of Competition" (abusing dominant position), reported the press-centre of FAS Russia.

"Severo-Zapadny Telecom" OJSC violated the law by requesting a notarized certification of a subscriber's signature, when agreeing with the subscriber upon an application of an alternative provider for providing Internet access services, based on xDSL technology, with the use of the subscriber's lines of "Severo-Zapadny Telecom" OJSC.

As for setting the rates for organizing and providing a subscriber's line for joint use at 200 Rubles per line (a lump sum) as a connection fee, and 100-110 Rubles per line (monthly payments) for providing the services, FAS Russia found the actions of "Severo-Zapadny Telecom" OJSC justified.

On 21st April 2009, the Commission of the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS Russia) found that "Sibir'telecom" OJSC violated Part 1 Article 10 of the Federal Law "On Protection of Competition" on the market of providing access to subscriber's lines in order to provide the Internet access services based on xDSL technology.

The case was imitated upon a petition of "Barnaul.ru" Ltd., which reported that "Sibir'telecom" OJSC had set overrated prices for joint use of a subscriber's link and a subscription fee for the providers in connecting their subscribers to the internet in comparison with the rates and subscription fee for providing Internet access using an existing subscriber's line for the subscribers of "Sibir'telecom" OJSC.

Based on the analysis of costs incurred and profit gained by "Sibir'telecom" OJSC for providing these services, FAS Russia established that the company set monopolistically high prices: the connection fee of 2200 Rubles per line (a lump sum) and 250 Rubles per line (monthly payments) for providing the services.

FAS Russia considers it necessary to state that such actions of "Severo-Zapadny Telecom" OJSC and "Sibir'telecom" OJSC create discriminatory conditions for subscribers of alternative providers in comparison with the subscribers that receive the Internet access services from the above companies. Also such actions create unequal conditions for operations of providers on the market of Internet access using the existing subscriber's lines, which can result in restricting competition on the market of Internet access services.

FAS Russia will issue determinations to "Severo-Zapadny Telecom" OJSC and "Sibir'telecom" OJSC on eliminating the antimonopoly violations.