Georgian National Communications Commission refused to research facts of abuse of the dominant position in the internet market. Vakhtang Abashidze, a Chair of the Commission, says in his  July 3, 2015 letter, thet   currently the Commission doesn’t consider the research of the case relevant. ,,In order to ensure successful functioning of the retail market, the Commission considers priority promotion of the alternative operators’ entrance of the retail internet   market and  development of the free competition in this market. This will promote establishment of the competitive tariffs on the retail internet service using supply and demand mechanisms.  The National Communications Commission, along with international experts, is going to implement comprehensive  study and analysis of the  relevant segments of the internet services. Only after and as the result of this analysis, the Commission will consider to impose specific obligations promoting competition on the operators with significant market power set on the specific segment of the market. Based on the above, the Commission doesn’t consider reasonable to start administrative proceedings, setting marginal tariff  limit for companies having major  power over the retail market segment.”

“Young Barristers” doesn’t appreciate such approach to the issue. As long as the Commission doesn’t specify certain period for the market research, it should mean, that research will be carried out in reasonable time. “The organization would like to implement monitoring of the process and accordingly requests the Commission to communicate with “Young Barristers” in case, if the civil sector is going to be involved in the process. 

According to  “Young Barristers”, for today, some ten internet  providers are operating within Georgian internet market and 60 % of it, is owned by two major companies : “Caucasus Online“ and  “Silknet”. The current,  actually dominant position of these companies, raises reasonable doubts, that consumers’ legal rights and interests are determined by   secret agreements establishing  joint tariff policy between these dominant companies. Accordingly, this represents the fact of abuse of dominating position on behalf of the companies. The organization notes, that since March, 2015,  internet providers have significantly increased tariffs for internet services. This may be regarded as  unilateral violation of agreements with consumers on behalf of the companies, as no justification has been represented  to the consumers  to explain increased tariffs. 

“Young Barristers” appealed to the Competition Agency to consider the facts of abuse of dominant position in the internet market on May 5. However, the Competition  Agency  transferred organization’s appeal to the Georgian National Communication Commission, providing, that they are not authorized to discuss the issue. “Young Barristers” appealed to the Georgian National Communication Commission for exploring the issue of dominating positions of the main internet market players already in July, 2014, however, the National Communication Commission has not responded to the issue.