The Irish regulatory authority ComReg has recently (5 Nov 2004) determined the wholesale charge for full unbundling of metallic local loops on Eircom’s network at €14,65 per month.

ComReg now makes a proposal as follows:

“Given current circumstances in the marketplace and given that the price for full unbundling allows for the recovery of all network related costs, ComReg proposes to amend the basis for costing Line Share such that the price should equate to the incremental costs of the service i.e. the associated billing and administration activities. ComReg believes that the effect of this proposal would be to reduce the price from €9.00 to €0.39, a reduction of 96%.”

ComReg’s consultation document is very short (only 9 pages), and does not go into details on the proposed cost-accounting methodology.

In essence, ComReg invites interested parties to comment on its proposed revised wholesale charge, and asks whether there are any other incremental costs that should be considered in calculating the shared access monthly rental charge.

T-REGS Note: €14,65 is a comparatively high charge for full unbundling, whilst €0,39 would be among the very lowest shared access charges in the European Union (apart from temporary exceptions in some EU Member States where the charge was set at zero).

The full text of the ComReg consultation document can be accessed by clicking here.

The deadline for responding to this consultation is 3 Dec 2004.