The volume of traffic on the fixed-line network totaled about 2.513 billion minutes in the last quarter of 2005, representing a fall of 9.9% on the same quarter of 2004. These minutes came from 801 million calls. The total number of minutes for the year was 10.269 billion minutes for 2005, down 13.9% on 2004. This decline in overall traffic can be put down to a sharp fall in dial-up internet access, resulting from strong growth in broadband internet access.
There were about 2.122 billion minutes of voice traffic originating from the fixed-line network in the last quarter, 1.9% less than a year before. In the year there was a total of 8.385 billion minutes - a year on year fall of 4.2%.
PT Group's share of total traffic continued its downward trend, down to 76% in terms of minutes in the last quarter and giving an average share of 78.2% over the year. In voice traffic PT Group's share fell to 72.6% in the quarter, down one percentage point on the previous quarter and giving an average of 74.1% for the year of 2005, compared to 78.1% in 2004.
In the fourth quarter of 2005, 20.4% of the total number of minutes came from calls made through indirect access, up 0.1% on the previous quarter, and up 1.4% on the same quarter of the previous year.
Of all the voice calls made, 20.8% were made using indirect access. This is in line with the previous quarter but up 1.3% on the same quarter of the year before.
The number of direct access clients declined to 3.133 million at the end of December, a fall of 1.6% compared to the previous quarter but in line with the fourth quarter of 2004. New providers saw a significant increase in the number of their direct access clients (19.1%). This rise was helped by new GSM supported products and the growth offers bundling fixed-line telephone access, cable television and/or internet. These offers also contributed to a stabilization, in annual terms, of the total number of direct access customers.
As far as indirect access through pre-selection is concerned, there were 470 thousand clients at the end of 2005, 19.1% more than in 2004. In call by call selection there were 102 thousand active clients, a similar figure to the previous year.
PT Group's share of direct access clients continued to fall. In the final quarter it stood at 88.9%, down 2% on the previous quarter and down 4.9% on the same period last year.
However, when it comes to indirect access the other providers continued to hold on to a market share of over 99%, a level that has held since liberalization of the fixed-line telephone service.
The number of main telephone accesses installed at customer's request rose to 4.127 in the quarter, representing a penetration rate of 40 per 100 residents. This figure is line with the previous quarter but down 0.5% on the year.
PT Group's share of accesses accounted for 89% of all accesses installed at customer's request, down 1.6% on the previous quarter and down 4.2% on the year.
In the same period 45 thousand public phones were installed, 1.6% less than the previous quarter and 4.4% less than the year before.
The average length of calls reached 3.14 minutes, slightly up on the previous quarter's figure of 2.72 minutes, but down on the same quarter of the previous year, as a result of the sharp and continuing fall in internet access traffic.
As of the end of 2005, there were 22 authorized providers of fixed telephone service, of which 14 were active.
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