TRA fines Etisalat for Dh400,000, sets 16 May as deadline (UAE)

www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Etisalat, country’s largest mobile operator, will be fined Dh400,000 for failure to comply with fair-competition rules demanded by the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA).
The country’s two operators were asked to introduce carrier pre-selection service, which enables landline telecom users to choose between the operators.
According to the regulator, the deadline was given to both the operators in June’08, the deadline which Etisalat failed to fulfill.
It was last month that TRA fined Etisalat Dh200, 000 and issued a new deadline of April 16, which also remained unfulfilled. The fine has since been doubled to Dh400, 000 and a new deadline of May 16 has been set. The regulator said the fine would continue to be doubled for each month of non-compliance.
Etisalat said it had upgraded 70% of its network to enable carrier pre-select, while the remaining 30% allows the service to be used with special dialing codes or devices.
“They decided unilaterally that they will not go with the full system. It was unacceptable to us. We believe it will lock competition in the fixed-line service because the second operator cannot launch a service in islands of geographical locations,” Mohammad Al Ganem, director-general of TRA said.