Double Antitrust fine towards Edison Energy need Wind Tre for unfair business practices. The Antitrust has established a fine of 3,8 million to Edison Energia need 5 million to Wind Tre. The measures were published in the last Bulletin of the Agcm, the guarantor for competition and the market.
Antitrust sanctions Edison Energia which rejects the charges
The proceeding - reads the Antitrust Bulletin - is in relation "to the promotion and sale of energy and gas supply services provided on the free market, with reference to the lack of transparency and completeness of the economic conditions of supply represented on the website and through other advertising distribution channels, with specific reference to the existence and quantification of the costs applicable to users, such as in particular the marketing costs and the system of discounts and economic advantages”.
The Antitrust investigation moved in March 2022, explains the Authority, "in the wake of a generalized verification, conducted by the Authority, regarding the behavior of a series of operators in the energy sector during the promotion and dissemination of commercial offers in the free market the supply of electricity and natural gas services, in particular in terms of completeness and transparency of information, in the context of contractual and promotional material". The investigation made use of the opinions of Agcom and Arera, the two Authorities responsible respectively for Communications and the Energy market.
Edison's answer
Edison Energia “believes that the Authority's provision raises objections of an exclusively formal nature to the messages circulated on Edison Energia's marketing channels, without providing any assessment and relative justification regarding the alleged infringement of consumers' rights”. Therefore, “Edison Energia rejects the responsibility attributed to it and reserves all actions for its own protection, trusting that it can demonstrate its non-involvement in the disputed facts before the competent authorities”.
The Antitrust sanctions Wind Tre: it has activated unsolicited Giga options
Wind Tre will have to pay a 5 million euro fine for automatically activating an additional paid service for its customers who hold a prepaid "voice and internet" SIM card. In particular, the company is fined for having increased the monthly cost of the customers' tariff plans by at least 2 euros in exchange for the offer of additional Giga, without the latter having given any prior consent. Thus writes the Antitrust in the latest Bulletin:
The paid Giga increase, as configured in the maneuvers subject of this proceeding (the one started in December 2021 and the one started in May 2022), represents an optional additional service with its own specific cost, as the consumer has the possibility of waive this option and maintain the previous separate contractual conditions, including economic ones. However, the choice to join the supplementary option is granted only in opt-out. Thus, the activation of the service that offers additional Giga and the related additional charge compared to the main tariff plan of the consumer user, they occur automatically without prior and express consent by these. Consequently, this conduct obliges customers to expressly express, in the manner and within the terms indicated by the operator, rather than their consent to the activation, their eventual rejection of the pre-established option, in the absence of which Wind Tre automatically proceeds with the relative charge. The consumer who does not intend to use the new service is therefore forced, in order to avoid the charge, to take steps to renounce the additional service and to keep the existing contract unchanged.
Antitrust Bulletin 42-2022
