ART requests modifications to France Telecom's new reference offer and orders France Telecom to apply its decision of 8 February

5 April 2001

Autorité de régulation des télécommunications (ART) has just taken two major decisions regarding France Telecom's reference offer for local loop unbundling.

- In a sanctions procedure, it orders France Telecom to apply certain measures from ART's decision dated 8 February, which to date have not yet been applied

- It requires that France Telecom modify new points in this offer which were introduced on 23 February.

• Review of the situation

France Telecom published its reference offer on 22 November 2000 in accordance with the decree dated 12 September 2000 on the implementation of unbundling.

On 8 February 2001, based on the European regulation authorising it to impose modifications to the reference offer, ART asked France Telecom to modify its initial offer.

On 23 February 2001, France Telecom published a new offer which took into account some of the measures in the decision of 8 February but which, on a number of other measures, did not conform with the decision. At the same time, France Telecom also appealed a number of points.

On 2 March 2001, ART rejected France Telecom's request, except for one reservation. It also stipulated that it continued to analyse the new reference offer. It is on this basis that ART has taken the following two decisions today.

• ART initiates a sanction procedure against France Telecom for not applying its decision dated 8 February 2001

In this decision, ART asked France Telecom to:

- modify the service access tariff for providing full access and shared access, bringing it to less than FRF 708, rather than FRF 1067 as suggested by France Telecom

- allow distant collocation whenever necessary by allowing the laying of an additional cable between France Telecom distribution frame and the new entrant operator's premises, as long as these premises are no further than 500 metres from the distribution frame

ART notes that, since its refusal of the appeal, France Telecom has not applied its decision. Therefore, it orders France Telecom to publish a reference offer before 13 April, in accordance with the decision dated 8 February 2001.

• ART imposes a modification to France Telecom's new reference offer

ART notes that France Telecom introduced new measures in its offer of 23 February 2001. some of them, primarily pricing measures, requiring the following modification:

- tests for introducing new technologies
The FRF 300.000 price requested by France Telecom must not be included in the reference offer until the contents of this service have been clearly determined

- 4-hour restoration deadline for service interruption
Whereas France Telecom requests FRF 64 per line per month, ART considers that the price of this service should not exceed FRF 39 and that France Telecom must introduce penalties if it does not meet its obligations

- evaluation of available surface area for a collocation room
France Telecom requests FRF 10,000 per site in the largest cities and FRF 15,000 in others. ART considers that any costs incurred by France Telecom must not be specifically charged, but must be covered by the room fitting tariffs

- site visits
ART considers that the hourly rate of FRF 1,400 per person and per working hour, plus a fixed rate of FRF 7,000, requested by France Telecom, is excessive. There must not be any fixed charge, and the variable price must not exceed FRF 372 per person for working hours and FRF 744 for weekend or night hours.

ART asks that France Telecom publish a new reference offer respecting these conditions before 13 April 2001.

ART is particularly attentive to the concrete and rapid application of access to the local loop as stipulated in Community and national texts in the interest of the consumer. The decisions it takes on the subject aim to encourage this complex but necessary process, by establishing the bases on which direct and fair negotiations can be held between operators giving tangible results on the ground in coming months. They also facilitate the implementation of diversified offers based on ADSL technologies.