Stop at telephone offers targeted to users to attract them to change operator. At the end of October, the government, following the indications of the Antitrust, proposed a amendment to the Draft Law on Competition, to put an end to the practice of differentiated offers based on the operator from which potential customers come, a practice known as “operator attacks”.
What are operator attack offers?
Le “operator attack” offers are commercial strategies which aim to "steal" customers from a competing telephone operator. The goal is to attract with offers aimed at savings the customer of another operator. Thus, limited "ad hoc" offers are formulated aimed at specific groups of customers active with one or more competing operators.
To take advantage of these offers, the user must request telephone number portability. Number portability is a fundamental requirement to activate these targeted offers.
Stop changing operator to get promotions
The proposed amendment seeks to establish a brake on the continuous change of operator to take advantage of advantageous offers. In fact, users often find themselves forced to change operator to benefit from favorable promotions in the mobile telephony sector, reserved exclusively to those coming from another operator.
The objectives of the amendment
The intervention is designed for two reasons. First, the goal is ensure uniform prices for all customers, regardless of the operator they come from. Secondly, we try to protect small operators who, often targeted by aggressive offers, risk their survival in the competitive environment of the sector.
The proposed amendment seeks to establish a “non-discrimination obligation based on the supplier of origin". While on the one hand the Consumers' Association Udicon expressed support for the government's decision, seen as a step towards free competition in the sector, the unions in the telecommunications sector expressed their disappointment in this regard.
Unions protest: "risk of leveling offers downwards"
The decision to put an end to the "operator attack", however, does not please the telecommunications unions who have said they are against the solution. The amendment to the Competition Bill is criticized by the SLC-CGIL, Fistel-CISL and UILCOM-UIL unions. because it would prevent targeted recovery actions in certain areas of the market. According to them, this measure will not prevent the practice of dumping (commercial practice in which a company sells a product at a price lower than the price charged in the national market) and could lead to a general leveling downwards of offers in the sector with possible negative consequences on jobs, infrastructure investments and virtual operators that depend on these infrastructures.
“With the amendment that prohibits differentiated offers to telephone service customers, a dogma, incomprehensible and yet untouchable until today, is finally called into question, but it does not resolve the problem of reckless dumping that is killing the telecommunications market. By preventing recovery actions targeted on specific market segments, there is a real risk of level everything even further down. To avoid potentially distorting practices of large operators equipped with technological infrastructures, the foundations are laid to inflict a mortal blow on the sector, with clear repercussions on employment and infrastructure investments" we read in the joint note from the unions.
The unions suggest theadoption of a minimum tariff, uniform for all operators, which covers both personnel costs and those relating to industrial investments.
The opinion of the Antitrust
The choice to propose this amendment derives from concerns raised in June fromAntitrust when the authority had clearly requested intervention from the government and parliament on the issue.
For the Competition Authority, the practices of targeted offers could have a extremely negative impact on the development of competition in mobile telephony, "contributing to blocking the development of new entrant operators and at most causing the exit of some of them from the market, eliminating the competitive stimulus towards traditional operators which has so far brought numerous benefits to end consumers".
In addition to the competition issue, the Antitrust has raised consumer protection concerns, highlighting that these offers were subject to sanctions for lack of transparency and clarity regarding all cost items included in the final purchase price.
Currently, the amendment proposed by the Government has been approved only in the Senate Committee. Before it becomes effective law, it must receive approval from both the Senate and the House. Meanwhile, the text of the amendment may be subject to change, especially following the intervention of the unions.
