OREANDA-NEWS. April 03, 2012. The Office of the Federal Antimonopoly Service in the Ulyanovsk Region (Ulyanovsk OFAS Russia) fined “Roselecom” OJSC over 620,000 Rubles, reported the press-centre of FAS Russia.

The case was initiated upon a petition of the Head of the Authority of “Barysh Town Settlement” Municipal Unit, forwarded by the Prosecutor’s Office of Barysh District, the Ulyanovsk Region, regarding the fact of changing the rates for telecommunications services of “Roselecom” OJSC in Barysh from 1st June 2011 and failure to duly notify its subscribers and (or) users of telecommunications services.

Ulyanovsk OFAS Russia found that “Roselecom” OJSC violated Part 1 Article 10 of the Federal Law “On Protection of Competition”. The company failed to specify a reasonable deadline for selecting the payment system for local telephone connections, or for refusing the clients in eight localities in the Ulyanovsk region to choose (accept) an offer under different terms and conditions due to introduction of a time charging system for local telephone connections from 1st June 2011.

With introduction of a time charging system for telephone connections, the subscriber fee increased from 258 Rubles to 370 Rubles. However, since the subscriber fee had been increasing from 1st June 2011, and the information about introducing the time charging system for telephone connections was published on 19th May 2011, subscribers – physical persons were not given a reasonable deadline for selecting a payment system for local telephone connections – a time charging or a subscriber fee systems, because the notice specified that an application regarding a selected payment system should be filed ten days before 1st June 2011.

Effectively physical persons were allowed two - three days to exercise their rights for selecting a payment system. Thus, subscribers – physical persons, wishing to pay for local telephone connections according to the time charging system, but did not have enough time to file an application to change the payment system, were forced to pay for local telephone connections in June 2011 under the payment system based on a subscriber fee.

“Apparently, “Roselecom” OJSC had a possibility to introduce time charging separately for municipal units, by giving reasonable deadline for the clients to choose a price plan needed by a client. I think that fines are not only punitive, but also warning measures, because they show other economic entities that violating the antimonopoly law can results in heavy sanctions”, commented Deputy Head of Ulyanovsk OFAS Russia, Konstnatin Popov.