Under the terms of and for the purposes of paragraph 1 of article 98 of Código do Procedimento Administrativo (Administrative Proceeding Code), ANACOM announces the following:
By determination of 15 September 2017, the Board of Directors of Autoridade Nacional de Comunicações (ANACOM) has decided to commence a procedure to prepare a regulation on the methodology to be used to determine the remuneration payable by electronic communications companies in consideration for access to and use of infrastructure suitable for carrying electronic communications networks, as under paragraph 4 of article 19 of Decree-Law no. 123/2009 of 21 May (amended by Decree- Law no. 92/2017 of 31 July).
Since its inception, this Decree- Law has established a regime of open access to infrastructure suitable for carrying electronic communications networks, in order to facilitate and encourage the deployment of high-speed electronic communications networks by electronic communications companies, promoting the use of existing suitable infrastructures. In this respect, the Decree- Law determines that remuneration for access to and use of the infrastructure owned or managed by the undertakings identified in article 2 should be oriented to costs, as defined in paragraph 1 of article 19; such costs comprise the following:
a) costs incurred in the construction, maintenance, repair and improvement of the infrastructure in question;
b) administrative costs incurred in processing applications, in particular requests for the installation, repair or removal of cables or other electronic communications network components;
c) costs of overseeing interventions.
In this context, it is set out in paragraph 4 of article 19 of Decree-Law no. 123/2009 of 21 May, that ANACOM approves the methodology to be used to determine the remuneration payable by electronic communications companies in consideration for access to and use of infrastructure suitable for carrying electronic communications networks. ANACOM will approve this methodology by regulation, after hearing other relevant regulatory authorities, including the energy regulator for the electricity sector or natural gas sector and transportation of crude oil and petroleum products.
It should be noted that, pursuant to paragraph 3 of Article 19 of this Decree-Law, the regulation identified in the previous point does not apply to local authorities, who are responsible themselves for defining the methodology to be used for determining the remuneration payable for access to and use of suitable infrastructure which they own or manage.
In accordance with paragraph 5 of article 19 of Decree Law no. 123/2009 of 21 May, the methodology to be approved by ANACOM will enable calculation of the value of remuneration in respect of the investment executed in the construction of infrastructure, as well as the value of the remuneration that is due as consideration for the management and maintenance of the infrastructure to be provided by the undertaking responsible for its operation.
Stakeholders may submit any contributions or suggestions for consideration under the current regulatory procedure. These should be sent to ANACOM, in writing and in Portuguese, no later than 9 October 2017 by email to regulamento-DL123@anacom.pt 1.
At a later date, stakeholders will have opportunity to express their views on the draft regulation as it is submitted for public consultation, in accordance with the provisions of article 10 of the Statutes of ANACOM, with its publication on ANACOM's institutional website (www.anacom.pt) and in the 2nd Series of the Diário da República (Official Journal).
ANACOM will examine the contributions and suggestions advanced by interested parties, and with the approval of the regulation in question, will produce a report referring to all contributions received and providing an overall assessment that reflects ANACOM's position thereon and its reasoning for the options taken.
1 Each email may contain one or more files as long as the total size of all files does not exceed 10 megabytes and, if necessary, comments may be divided into two or more emails.
