Manx Telecom fined £100,000 by CURA

Authority finds company breached its regulatory obligations

Manx Telecom has been fined £100,000 after breaching its regulatory obligations.

It follows a complaint made to the Communications and Utilities Regulatory Authority by competitor Sure.

That was lodged on 23 August last year in relation to Manx Telecom’s treatment of Sure’s application to facilitate an interconnection request between Sure and BT.

It was alleged that MT was in breach for a number of reasons including, but not limited to, allegations that it had withdrawn options previously presented ‘without any justification’.

It was further argued that these options would have been the most efficient and cost effective from Sure’s perspective.

A subsequent investigation by CURA looked at whether MT had failed to meet its requirement to negotiate and conclude an interconnection agreement within a reasonable period of time.

It also considered whether the company had behaved in a manner that had deliberately frustrated the access request and interconnection agreement process.

Having considered Sure’s formal complaint, as well as other information gathered, CURA says it formed the view that there was reason to question whether MT had fully discharged its obligation to ‘negotiate in good faith on the requests’ with a view to concluding an agreement for interconnection within a reasonable period of time.

No other operator on the Island could provide the access that is required to interconnect with BT.

The authority found that by withdrawing options presented to Sure and BT during the process without any objective justification Manx Telecom had breached its regulatory obligations.

It said that withdrawing the options of solutions at two sites where BT had its points of presence on the Island was not reasonable.

On 4 July this year CURA issued MT a ‘notice of contravention’ in relation to the matter.

The authority allowed until 1 August for representations which was then extended by 15 days at the request of MT.

CURA found that in order to take the actions it did MT needed to have ‘solid, tangible’ plans in place that would have predated the request from Sure.

As nothing was forthcoming the authority said it sees no grounds to change its view that Manx Telecom breached its licence with the £100,000 penalty standing.

You can read the full judgement HERE.