By its Decision No 199 of 24.03.2016 the Communications Regulation Commission (CRC) launched a public consultation procedure on a Draft Decision for amendment and supplement to the Rules and procedures for access to public information in the Communications Regulation Commission (adopted by Decision No. 387 of the Communications Regulation Commission of 17.04.2008, updated, SG, issue 45 of 13.05.2008, in force as of 13.05.2008, amended and supplemented in SG, issue 45 of 16.06.2009).

The full text of the Draft is published on the CRC’s website www.crc.bg under the section „Public consultations”.

By its Decision No. 46 of 28 January 2016 the Communications Regulation Commission launches a public consultation procedure on the provision of coordinated frequency resource for the territory of the city of Sofia.

On 23 March 2016 the Communications Regulation Commission (CRC) held a meeting with postal operators and discussed issues related to the development of the postal sector. Representatives of Bulgarian Posts EAD, Econt Express OOD, Speedy AD, Tip – Top Courier AD, Star Post OOD, In Time OOD, Flying Cargo Bulgaria OOD, DHL Express Bulgaria EOOD, Evropat 2000 AD and Leo Express EOOD participated in the meeting.

The agenda addressed major topics of the European Regulators Group for Postal Services (ERGP) activities, a group chaired in 2016 by the Chairman of CRC – Veselin Bozhkov, Phd. The main focuses of the ERGP work related to the working methods for considering the efficiency of postal operators, analysis of the sector trends and the scope of the universal postal service, caused by the entry of the e-commerce, the reached level of market competition, the review of access regulation measures, ensuring transparency of cross-border parcels delivery, etc., were presented.

Within the discussion, the participants in the meeting discussed issues related to:

Protecting the rights of postal services end-users in Bulgaria, including problems regarding parcels delivery raised by consumers to CRC;

Role of e-commerce in building a well-functioning and competitive single market in Europe, including existing problems related to cross-border e-commerce parcels delivery.

Undertaking activities for raising the consumers’ awareness of their rights and the conditions for e-commerce parcels delivery/development of guidelines on the rights of online shoppers, etc.

Role of CRC to ensure the sustainable provision of universal postal service (UPS) and the need for changes in the assignment and scope of UPS.

Active participation of the Bulgarian postal operators in elaborating the medium-term ERGP strategy and in the upcoming seminar with postal sector stakeholders, at European level, to be held on 30 June 2016 in Bulgaria.

Administrative barriers encountered by postal operators in agreeing the general terms and conditions of contracts with consumers of postal services.

In conclusion, the participants in the discussion agreed to hold regular meetings with CRC, aiming to determine the priorities for cooperation, exchanging of information and undertaking coordinated actions. CRC has made a commitment to assist the Commission for Consumer Protection in accelerating the procedure for amending the contents of the UPS and non-UPS general conditions.

By Decisions No. 165 and No. 166 of 15 March 2016 CRC launched public consultation procedures on draft Decisions on definition of cost-oriented call termination rates at a fixed location on individual public telephone networks and individual mobile networks for the period 2016-2020. The draft Decisions determine the values of the cost-oriented rates that CRC intends to continue/impose as specific obligations under the draft decisions for the third round analyses of the wholesale markets for call termination on individual public telephone networks and individual mobile networks provided at a fixed location (public consultation procedures launched by Decisions No. 41 and No. 44 of 28 January 2016).

The rates are determined in accordance with Recommendation 2009/396/EC of the European Commission and are calculated by adapted CRC’s BULRIC (Bottom-Up Long-Run Incremental Costs) models.

The draft decisions and the adapted BULRIC models for backbone fixed and mobile networks in Bulgaria are submitted for comments by the stakeholders and are published on the CRC’s website under the section „Public consultations”.

The Draft  market analysis is submitted for  public consultation to the interested parties and is published on the CRC’s website under  the Section "Public consultations" .

A new section „Anketi” (Surveys) has been created on the Communications Regulation Commission’s website. The published Survey on the satisfaction of end users with the quality of the Internet access service is intended for consumers using the Internet access service through fixed and mobile networks. The information collected from this survey shall be useful for CRC in view of fulfilling the obligations for monitoring the quality of the Internet access service provided by the operators and protection of end users’ interests. The survey is accessible at the following address:

http://crc.bg/anketa.php?id=&lang=bg&showAnketa=221