Spain's communications regulator CNMC has fined Telefonica a total of EUR 3 million for overcharging BT to access in wholesale network. Specifically, the regulator accused Telefonica of exceeding the Leased Line Reference Offer (or ORLA as it’s known in Spanish) in the monthly quotas charged to BT for accessing its backbone network, above all in relation to high capacity broadband services offered to businesses. The CNMC described Telefonica's conduct as a serious infringement of the regulations. The offence is alleged to have taken place between October 2015 and June 2016, during which BT is said to have lost nearly two percentage points (1.8%) of market share.
Telefonica now has two months to file a court appeal against the decision. This is the fifth major regulatory fine for Telefonica since October. In March it was fined another EUR 3 million for discriminatory conduct during the 2015 strike by its subcontracted installers, while in January it was fined 5 million for serious infringements in the local loop market. At the end of last year it received a EUR 6 million fine from the government of Andalucia for misleading advertising and unfair terms of a price increase for Fusion customers and in October the CNMC imposed another fine of EUR 5 million for other breaches in the wholesale business broadband market.
