The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission today issued a discussion paper on the ordinary access undertakings lodged by Hutchison Telecommunications (Australia) Limited and Hutchison 3G Australia Pty Ltd in relation to the mobile terminating access service.
"On 7 October 2005, Hutchison lodged six ordinary access undertakings with the ACCC relating to the MTAS", an ACCC Commissioner, Mr Ed Willett, said today. "Three of the undertakings have been submitted on behalf of HTAL and the remaining three on behalf of H3GA. Hutchison provided a submission in support of the undertakings on 13 October 2005.
"Hutchison's undertakings specify some of the price and non-price terms and conditions on which it proposes to supply the MTAS".
Under the Trade Practices Act 1974, the ACCC must accept or reject the undertakings based on whether it considers their terms and conditions to be reasonable.
The lodgement of the undertakings follows the ACCC's decision on 30 June 2004 to continue regulating MTAS. On this date, the ACCC decided to introduce a new approach to regulating the price of this service that would ensure a closer correlation between its price and cost. In its decision, the ACCC estimated that the cost of providing this service, including a normal profit, lay within a range of 5 to12 cents per minute.
Copies of the undertakings, the submission and the discussion paper will be available from the ACCC's website. The ACCC invites submissions on any aspect of the undertakings.