Today, November 26, 2004, the National Regulatory Authority for Communications concluded the calculation of the individual subsidy for fixed-line telephony.
Thus, the individual subsidy amounts to ROL404,810. This amount resulted from the division of ROL202.7 billion – i.e. 35% of the universal service fund, the sum destined to subsidy grants, by the 500,959 eligible applications received.
ANRC shall notify the universal service providers on the subsidy amount, and the respective providers shall operate the deduction of the subsidy starting with the first invoice issued to the beneficiaries. Should the amount of the subsidy exceed the value of the first invoice, the difference shall be correspondingly deducted in the next months’ invoices, up to the exhaustion of the whole subsidy.
The subsidies shall be granted to all the applicants who submitted – by November 1st – a standard application in order to be granted subsidies and facilities in case of non-payment of the telephone bill. The eligible applications were selected according to the following criteria: the applications had to be thoroughly and accurately completed, by the families with a monthly average income, per family member, lower than ROL2,460,000, who have concluded valid agreements with one of the 14 universal service providers.
The beneficiaries of the subsidies may also avail themselves of a series of facilities in case of non-payment of the telephone bill. Thus, the interest, increases or penalties charged for non-payment, within the due term, of the amounts owed by the subscriber, shall not exceed 0.15% of the respective amounts, per day of delay. As well, disconnection from the public telephone network shall not be operated earlier than 90 days from the date of suspending the service provision. During the whole period when the service is suspended, the subscriber will be able to initiate calls to the emergency number “112”, to 0800 green numbers as well as to other cost-free numbers: ambulance, fire brigade, and police. The service provision shall be resumed cost-free, within the suspension period, upon the subscriber’s payment of the invoice triggering the suspension, including respective instalments, increases or penalties.