7 Jan - "Comreg to issue flat rate decision today" Irish Times

124124

Originally posted by SkepticOne
Who could this insider be?

That rat.. may be!

sceptre

Originally posted by 124124
He added, however, that with no formal pricing structure in place, the group remained cautious and was concerned that Eircom's wholesale rates could be prohibitively expensive. The ComReg decision said only that Eircom's product must be "cost-oriented" and a ComReg spokesperson refused to elaborate on this. Long said any price above EUR35 per month for consumers would be excessive.

Too right. Nice to get that in - flatrate at €100 a month wouldn't be much good to anyone

crawler

It will all be down to the wholesale price.......if it follows the DSL lead then a wholesale price of over €30.00 would be on the cards.......now that would be pants.

Still - well done Comreg and I think a thanks to IOFFL too!

SkepticOne

Just a quick FYI: Chairman David Long is currently being interviewed by RTE Television news and will be appearing on the 9 o clock news.

MDR

nuts I wanted to say that ... :mad:

ihatemushrooms

€30 a month would be good in my opinion but what will the T`s &C`s be like? I would fear a cap would be put in place, I would guess around 150 hrs a month.

Any thoughts?

MDR

BT just recentily introduced a 150hr cap on their retail product... which works out at about 5hrs a day ... which is ample for residental users me thinks ?

JohnK

Originally posted by SkepticOne
Just a quick FYI: Chairman David Long is currently being interviewed by RTE Television news and will be appearing on the 9 o clock news.

I'll be watching for him

spongebob

Don't laff.

Eircom say that their DSL is 30 times faster than 56k

The Cap on that is 3GB so they will introduce 1/30th the Cap for the slower product which in RatSpEEk means:

'ye are no worse off lads'

M

SkepticOne

Originally posted by JohnK
I'll be watching for him

The interview is taking place is a mildly ironic location.

neverhappen

Originally posted by Serbian

"The ruling by the court effectively halts a decision by the German regulator RegTP demanding DT [Deutsche Telekom] be required to offer a wholesale flat-rate Internet access product (known in the acronym-friendly world of telecoms as FRIACO) to its competitors. This is on the basis that DT no longer offers such a product at the retail level." [/B]

reading further....

-
The flip-side of this regulatory coin is that when incumbents aren’t using a wholesale product themselves, they have no obligation to offer it to others, and this is the justification for the court’s decision. The same reasoning has been applied by regulators in other European countries who have refused to mandate FRIACO provision by incumbents who don’t provide a retail flat-rate product.

Glimmer of hope?

However, the new EU regulatory framework for electronic communications makes clear that the non-discrimination argument is not the only one which regulators and ISPs can use to force FRIACO to be provided. This offers a glimmer of hope for the likes of AOL, and those who depend on their services.

The new EU rules contain a provision for national regulators to require incumbents to meet reasonable requests for access to network elements where denial of access would hinder the emergence of a sustainable competitive market at the retail level.

This provision could easily be used by regulators keen to see the introduction of FRIACO in countries where incumbents are not currently offering retail flat-rate packages. It could also be used in the appeals process against the Cologne court’s decision.
--



and checking out the comms regulation act part 5 sect 57 ...
-
(7) In making a decision in relation to a dispute, the Commission
may impose conditions for physical infrastructure sharing and such
conditions may include, but not necessarily be limited to—
(a) conditions in respect of conformity with the relevant standards
relating to establishment, operation, maintenance
and repair of electronic communications infrastructure
and physical infrastructure,
(b) compliance with essential requirements or the maintenance
of the quality of electronic communications services or
both, or
(c) rules for the apportionment of the costs of physical infrastructure
sharing,
and the Commission shall notify, in writing, the network operator
and physical infrastructure provider, as appropriate, of the reasons
for such conditions.
-

IANAL, but it seems to me that comreg are acting within their remit here...
-

SkepticOne

Originally posted by neverhappen
reading further....

-
The flip-side of this regulatory coin is that when incumbents aren�t using a wholesale product themselves, they have no obligation to offer it to others, and this is the justification for the court�s decision. The same reasoning has been applied by regulators in other European countries who have refused to mandate FRIACO provision by incumbents who don�t provide a retail flat-rate product.

I'm not a lawyer either, but ComReg's directive lays down the points of law involved. If Eircom had a retail flat-rate offering then it would be mandatory for them to offer a wholesale one. That is all the regulation says. Neither the incumbent, nor the regulator would have any choice in this instance.

This does not imply the converse, i.e., if Eircom don't have a retail offer, they can't be made to provide a wholesale one.

I'm not familiar with the German case. Were two OLOs negotiating for six months? Did these negotiations break down? Did the the German regulator dot all the i's and cross the t's.

highlight

The laws are different. FRIACO was directed under a 'reasonable request' approach, not because of non discrimination

De Rebel

Nowhere in the Decision Notice does it mention whether the remit of this notice is analogue 28k/56k only, or whether it extends to include ISDN access. Has this been covered anywhere? Are there any assurances or do we just wait and see?

Other than that it seems quite welcome. The timeline is eerily reminiscent of that prepared by one VinneyFitz the day the directive was first announced!

Shocking to see that Muck fella “outed” as an industry insider. And there I was thinking he was a sound man.

PiE

Originally posted by De Rebel
Shocking to see that Muck fella “outed” as an industry insider. And there I was thinking he was a sound man.

Hehe, scandalous :]

Hurrah for FRIACO finally being within touching distance but June? Jeez...

The interview is taking place is a mildly ironic location.

If it's in or around the Eircon offices... plyd :]

SkepticOne

Well, I guess this is another one for Yellum's Timeline of Significant Events.

January 7, 2003: ComReg issues FRIACO directive to Eircom.

BoneCollector

BT just recentily introduced a 150hr cap on their retail product... which works out at about 5hrs a day ... which is ample for residental users me thinks

Curious though!
if we do the math

56kbs at 150 hrs pm for €30 pm
Gives us the same 3GB cap as errcom ADSL (for how much a month!?)
So we should be getting adsl with a 3GB cap for €30 pm as it would be the same as fraico 56k 150 hrs

Which all goes to show how rediculously OVERPRICED! errcoms adsl realy is!

David C

Originally posted by SkepticOne
June 7, 2003: ComReg issues FRIACO directive to Eircom.

January, no?

vinnyfitz

Tonight's RTE news web headline on the subject:
Many Internet users are likely to have cheaper access to the web from June next year.

Perhaps they have been talking to Eircom's lawyers and know more than we do? Or perhaps they are caught in a time warp....:D

kamobe

There'll be a nice article in today's indo referring Comregs decision. IOFFL get a nice mention:

According to David Long, chairman of lobby group Ireland Offline, a retail offer of anything above €35 a month would not be a goer.

The ComReg notice was welcomed by many market participants including Esat BT, Ireland Offline and the Chambers of Commerce of Ireland.

My favourite paragraph is as follows:

Market watchers said that the notice is similar to one issued to BT in Britain by Oftel back in 2000 that resulted in FRIACO being supplied in the market there within six months of the order.

Here's hoping....

Article here.

EDIT:

I also stumbled accross a similiar article on Eircomnet (of all places!) which is also worth a read

ciderandhavoc

thats just an ireland.com article, they feed to eircom.net (as do the indo).

zynaps

Originally posted by vinnyfitz
Tonight's RTE news web headline on the subject:
Many Internet users are likely to have cheaper access to the web from June next year.

June 2004? Sooner than we might have expected...

zynaps

MDR

I also stumbled accross a similiar article on Eircomnet (of all places!) which is also worth a read

Apache Tomcat/4.0.1 - HTTP Status 404 - Not Found

vinnyfitz

ESAT BT quoted in the same piece as saying they look forward to offering a product in the €25 to €30 per month price range. I'll believe it when I see it.

kamobe

Originally posted by MDR
Apache Tomcat/4.0.1 - HTTP Status 404 - Not Found

Heh - they've taken it down, how open minded of them....

*shocked*